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HIGH SCHOOL 

GEOGRAPHY 

PHYSICAL, ECONOMIC, AND 
REGIONAL 



BY 






CHARLES RED WAY DRYER, F.G.S.A., F.R.G.S. 

FORMERLY PROFESSOR OF GEOGRAPHY AND GEOLOGY 

INDIANA STATE NORMAL SCHOOL 

AUTHOR OF "LESSONS IN PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY" 



REVISED EDITION 




AMERICAN BOOK COMPANY 
NEW YORK CINCINNATI CHICAGO BOSTON ATLANTA 



A 



*1V 



Copyright, ign, 1912, by 
CHARLES REDWAY DRYER 

Copyright, 1920, by 
AMERICAN BOOK COMPANY 



iLntered at Stationers' Hall, London 



Dr. H. S. Geog. 



OCT -8 f920 



©CU576781 






PREFACE 

That the better part of geography is to be found in a study of 
relationships is the conviction of all geographers. Only by such 
study can an affirmative answer be given to Jowett's question, 
"Can geography be used to make students think?" There is 
no subject which presents a greater number and variety of 
relationships than geography. It leaves hardly any field of 
human knowledge untouched, and is the mutual debtor and 
creditor of all. It is capable of yielding a purely scientific 
discipline " uncontaminated with the worship of usefulness," 
and it can be made as baldly "practical" as the commercial 
spirit requires. The higher interests of education demand a 
judicious combination of pure and applied science. 

The most important thing about the earth is the fact that it 
is a human planet, that men not only live upon it, but make, 
somehow, a living out of it. The earth as a planet, a machine 
which "goes" and "works," an organism which has grown and 
developed in the past and will continue to do so in the future, 
has never been so thoroughly studied and understood as it is 
to-day. The main result of such study, under the name of 
physical geography, has been a favorite subject in secondary 
schools. Some special phases of human activity, more or less 
closely related to the earth, such as products, manufactures, 
trade, races, customs, language, religion, and government, are 
everywhere taught under the names of commercial and political 
geography. But these different kinds of geography are seldom 
brought closely together, •arid. th£ "crowning relationship of all 
geographic science, the relation of the human species to its 
natural environment, is generally missed or but dimly seen. 

To get a view of the earth, not only as the home of man, but 
as the garden in which he has grown, the school in which he has 

s 



6 PREFACE 

been educated and civilized, the environment in which still 
higher ideals may be attained, is the object of modern geograph- 
ical study. This can be accomplished only by taking an eco- 
nomic standpoint, from which the dependence of human life upon 
natural conditions and the influence of those conditions upon 
human life can be most clearly seen. This book is an attempt 
to present such a view and to treat the leading facts and prin- 
ciples of geography as factors in the human struggle for a better 
living, that is, for the highest possible civilization. Physical 
geography, a view of the earth as it would be if no man had ever 
lived upon it, forms the necessary basis. The first part of this 
book is called physical geography because the principal subject 
discussed in it is the natural earth, but the treatment is more 
brief than in many recent textbooks. Many topics of great 
interest to the student of pure science are omitted or lightly 
touched, preference being given to those features and processes 
which have directly "helped or hindered man in his progress." 
The fact is constantly kept in mind that man is himself a part 
of nature and the picture is painted from the beginning against 
a strong background of human life. 

The second part is called economic geography because the 
point of view is reversed, and the outlines of household manage- 
ment practiced by the great human family in its terrestrial 
home are presented against the background of the natural earth 
already shown. It is hoped that by this method of treatment 
the peculiar interest and value of physical geography will not 
be lost, while its use as a foundation for economic geography 
will give added attraction and stability to both. Parts I and II 
are planned to furnish as much material as can be used in a 
high school course of five or six months. 

For those schools which devote a longer period to the study 
of geography, Part III furnishes a more detailed, intimate, and 
graphic study of the same theme. The natural earth is still the 
basis and is divided into natural provinces arranged in a few 
groups, forming typical environments in which the economic 
adaptations of human life must be broadly similar, varying only 



PREFACE 7 

with the stage of civilization of the inhabitants. Where the 
civilization of a natural environment is not native, but has been 
introduced from some other more favorable environment, inter- 
esting contrasts appear; but in every case the possibilities are 
strictly limited by natural conditions. North America is found 
to present all the typical natural environments of the world 
except the strictly equatorial. A detailed discussion of these 
with references, more or less extended, to similar environments 
in other parts of the world, serves to bring out all the principal 
kinds of adaptation to natural environment which the human 
race has achieved, and gives a bird's-eye view of world economies. 
This part of the book comes near to being a concrete example 
of a recent definition of economic geography as "the study of 
the different types of environments in the relations they bear to 
the activities of human life. " 

The treatment by natural rather than by political and, conse- 
quently, artificial divisions is attended by no serious difficulty 
except in the handling of statistics, which are always compiled 
according to political units. The result is some slight want of 
exactness in figures, but as these are constantly changing, the 
defect is not great. The author recognizes the fact that such 
treatment is an innovation in some degree revolutionary; but 
he believes that the advantage it gives in showing the essential 
relationships of geography more than compensates for all diffi- 
culties, and that when once understood it will be accepted and 
welcomed. 

Reports of committees of the National Education Association 
and of the Association of American Geographers have recently 
outlined in some detail courses in geography for secondary schools. 
While this book has not been written on the plan of conforming 
to the requirements of either, it will be found to cover substan- 
tially the ground of both. 

An unusual number and variety of maps have been introduced 
in the hope of leading teachers and students to a better apprecia- 
tion and use of this unrivaled method of geographical expression. 



TABLE OF CONTENTS 



PART I. PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

Chapter Page Chapter Page 

I. Earth, Sun, and Moon. 9 X. Soils 139 

II. The Plan of the Earth 24 XI. The Sea 150 

III. World Economy 32 XII. Coasts and Ports 160 

IV. The Land 36 XIII. The Atmosphere 172 

V. Gradation by Streams 72 XIV. Moisture in the Air. . 193 

VI. The Economic Rela- XV. Climate 217 

tions of Streams. ... 95 X VI. Plant Regions 226 

VII. Gradation by Ice 113 X VII. The Geography of Ani- 

VIII. Standing Water 124 mals 243 

IX. Gradation by Ground XVIII. The Human Species. . . 255 
Water and Wind. . . 132 

PART II. ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY 

Chapter Page 

XIX. Natural Resources and Food Supply 263 

XX. Clothing and Constructive Materials 289 

XXI. Heat, Light, and Power 308 

XXII. Manufacture, Trade, and Transportation 318 

PART III. REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

XXIII. Natural Provinces 331 

XXIV. North America — Physiographic Provinces 341 

XXV. The Mississippian and Floridan Provinces 356 

XXVI. The Interior and Arizonan Provinces 391 

XXVII. The Californian and Oregon Provinces 412 

XXVIII. The People of the United States and Canada 419 

_ JXXTX: The* West European Province 425 

XXX. The Central European Province 453 

XXXI. The Mediterranean Province 467 

XXXII. The Manchurian and Chinese Provinces 481 

XXXIII. The Mexican and Caribbean Provinces 489 

XXXIV. Intertropical Provinces of South America 497 

XXXV. Intertropical Provinces of Asia and Africa 501 

XXXVI. Temperate Provinces of the Southern Hemisphere 508 

XXXVII. Cold Temperate and Polar Provinces 513 

The Economic Standing of the Principal Countries of the World. . 524 

Index 527 

Index of Reference Maps 543 



PART I. PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



CHAPTER I 



EARTH, SUN, AND MOON 

The Earth is a globular mass of rock, water, and air, tied to 
the sun by gravitation and revolving around it at a distance of 
about 93,000,000 miles. The core or central body of the earth 
is probably a solid ball of hot nickel-iron, with an outer crust 
largely composed of oxygen and silicon combined with other 
elements to form 
various kinds of 
rocks. The whole 
solid earth may be 
called the rock 
sphere {lit lio sphere). 
The depressions in 
the crust are occu- 
pied by a thin sheet 
of water which covers nearly three fourths of its surface and 
constitutes the water sphere {hydrosphere) . The rock and water 
spheres are surrounded and inclosed by an atmosphere of nitro- 
gen, oxygen, and other gases, the extent of which is not definitely 
known. 

The atmosphere is as truly a part of the earth as the rock, but this fact 
is often disregarded and the word earth is used to mean only the solid and 
liquid mass. In this sense the earth is a slightly compressed spheroid, its 
polar diameter being 7,899.6 miles, its equatorial diameter 7,926.6 miles, 
and its circumference about 24,900 miles. 

Men do not live upon the surface of the earth, which is the outer surface 

9 




Section of part of the earth . 



IO PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

of the atmosphere, but hundreds of miles below, on or near the surface of 
the rock and water spheres, which is commonly called the face of the earth. 

The Sun is a bright star, about no times the diameter of the 
earth. The body of the sun is surrounded by an atmosphere 
consisting of white-hot vapors of various metals, which radiate 
heat and light in every direction. The heat and light from the 
sun penetrate the earth's atmosphere and reach the land and 
water. The earth rotates on its shortest axis once in 24 hours, 
thus exposing different sides to the sun and causing an alterna- 
tion of sunlight and shadow, or day and night. The rotation 
of the earth is clearly shown by the apparent movement of the 
stars from east to west. 

Latitude and Longitude. — - The earth's rotation not only 
divides time into short periods of light and darkness, but also 
furnishes fixed points from which to measure distances and hx 
locations. 

If a mark is made upon the surface of a smooth, uniformly colored ball, 
it is impossible to describe its position for want of other points of reference. 
If the ball is set to spinning like a top, the rotation establishes an axis and 
two poles at opposite ends of it. A line may be drawn around the ball 
midway between the poles which will be an equator, or divider of the surface 
into two equal parts. A line may also be drawn from pole to pole at right 
angles to the equator. Then the position of any point on the ball may 
be determined and described by its angular distance from each of these 
lines. This is the meaning and purpose of latitude and longitude. 

Latitude (breadth) is angular distance from the equator toward 
each pole and is measured in degrees up to 90 degrees. Longitude 
(length) is angular distance from a line arbitrarily fixed at right 
angles to the equator, each way around to the opposite side of 
the earth, and is measured in degrees up to 180 degrees. For 
convenience a set of lines is imagined or drawn parallel with 
the equator, called parallels, and another set at right angles to 
the equator, called meridians. These lines form a network, 
which divides the face of the earth into quadrangles indispen- 
sable in surveying and mapping. 



EARTH, SUN, AND MOON 



II 




Polai-is 



Fig. 2. — Parallels and meridians. 

The number of parallels and meridians is unlimited. Portions of some 
of them are surveyed and located on the ground and form boundaries of 
states, counties, townships, and sections. They are drawn upon a map at 
any convenient distance apart, and the network is used to locate the 
desired features. The meridian passing through Greenwich, near London, 
is now used as a base line or prime meridian throughout the world. The 
axis of the earth always maintains the same direction in space, the north 
end of it looking toward a point in the 
heavens near the star Polaris, "the north 
star." To an observer at the equator Polaris 
is on the northern horizon (Fig. 3) ; but if he 
travels northward the star rises higher above 
the horizon until at the north pole it is 
directly overhead. Hence directions and lati- 
tude may be determined by observing the 
stars. 

The Seasons. — The earth revolves 
around the sun in a nearly circular 
orbit, requiring a little more than 365 
days to complete one revolution. The 
revolution of the earth may be seen 
by noticing that the groups of stars visible at any given hour 
of the night change from week to week, and month to month. If 
the axis of the earth were perpendicular to the plane of its orbit, 
its revolution would bring no change except in the appearance 
of the heavens at night, and would be of little importance; for 
in that case the line dividing the lighted side of the earth from 
the dark side would always pass through the poles, half of the 




Fig- 3- 







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ryT ' '/fVWt 


:::^%4#1:#1# # " , ;:/ ^ ' 




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WjB^ggjgm 


^^*^S^5 












vB^S'^ 




,00^^- SUN " 




tt^llill 


Ml 


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Fig. 4. —Position of the northern hemisphere throughout the year. 












x^ r ^ 



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-5- 
o 



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vV 



^■m. X 



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SS& 



Fig, 5. — (From Todd's New Astronomy.) 
12 



EARTH, SUN, AND MOON 



13 



northern and half of the southern hemisphere would always be 
in the light, and day and night would be A 

everywhere and always of equal length, 
as in Fig. 6 B. But the earth's axis is 
inclined about 23 30' from a perpendic- 
ular to the plane of its orbit, and always 
in the same direction. As the earth 
moves around the sun, the northern and 
southern hemispheres are turned toward 
the sun alternately and each in turn 
receives more than an equal share of 
sunlight, as in Fig. 6 A and C. When 
either hemisphere is turned toward the 
sun, every place in it is in sunlight more 
than half the time, and the days are 
longer than the nights. When it is turned 
away from the sun the reverse is true. 

Fig. 4 shows the conditions in the northern 
hemisphere for each month of the year. Fig. 5 
shows the apparent path of the sun in the 
heavens at different seasons in middle northern 
latitudes. The long path of the sun above the 
horizon in summer brings long days and a warm 
season; the short path in winter brings short days and a cold season. 

The sun's rays have greater heating power at noon than in 
the morning or evening because they then pass through less air, 







/ft| l[j|[|T|TjT| ^^-^^^^^ 


< 

< 

< 


1 W 


u< 


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< 


June 22 
B 

N.P. 

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11 H ( 


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March 21 
Sept. 23 

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Fig. 6. 




strike the earth more nearly at right angles, and are spread over 
less surface (Fig. 7). When the days are long the sun's rays 



14 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

are more nearly direct and their heating power is greater than 
when the days are short. Thus the inclination of the earth's 
axis brings about a variation in the length of the day and in 
the angle of the sun's rays, and these changes work together to 
make the months successively warmer or colder. 

The most important points in this cycle of changes are: (i) The vernal 
equinox, March 21, when the sun is vertical at the equator and shines to 
either pole. The days and nights are everywhere of equal length and the 
angle of the sun's rays is the same at corresponding latitudes in both hemi- 
spheres. (2) The summer solstice, June 22, when the sun is vertical at the 
tropic of Cancer, 23 30' north of the equator, and shines 23 30' beyond 
the north pole to the Arctic circle. In the northern hemisphere the days 
are longer and the sun's rays more direct than at any other date. (3) The 
autumnal equinox, September 23, when the conditions are the same as at 
the vernal equinox; (4) The winter solstice, December 22, when the sun's 
rays are vertical at the tropic of Capricorn, 23 30' south of the equator, 
shine 23 30' beyond the south pole to the Antarctic circle, and fall short 
of reaching the north pole. In the northern hemisphere the days are 
shorter and the sun's rays are more slanting than at any other date. The 
change of conditions from one of these dates to the next is gradual. 

The inequality of day and night and the variation in the 
angle of the sun's rays increase toward the poles; therefore 
the contrast between summer and winter increases in the same 
direction. The presence of permanent ice and snow in the polar 
regions renders the seasonal differences there less than they 
otherwise would be. Between the tropics the differences of 
temperature are slight and the seasons are distinguished as wet 
(summer) and dry (winter). The year of four strongly marked 
seasons is found only in middle latitudes. 

Economic Relations. — The light and heat of the sun furnish 
the energy which keeps things alive and moving on the earth. 
The supply is not continuous and uniform, but subject to the 
interruptions of day and night and the variations of the seasons. 
Plants and animals are very sensitive to these changes, which 
impose upon them alternating periods of activity and rest. 
Outside the polar regions, every space of 24 hours is divided 



EARTH, SUN, AND MOON 1 5 

into a period of daylight and a period of darkness. In daylight 
plants and animals, including man, are generally active in 
obtaining food and acquiring whatever is necessary or desired 
for subsistence. Darkness is generally a period of rest during 
which they assimilate food, build up tissue, repair waste, and 
renew strength. For men the regular and frequent recurrence 
of periods of sleep, preferably during the hours of darkness, is 
absolutely necessary to health and efficiency. 

The influence of change of seasons upon plants is very great. In equa- 
torial regions vegetation is luxuriant at all times, but alternations of wet 
and dry periods induce some variation in the rate of growth. Where the 
contrast of seasons is strong, more than half the plants pass the cold or 
dry season in the form of seed, and more than half the animals live less than - 
a year. Many animals live over the winter by migrating to a warmer 
region, by using the food stored during the summer, or by lying torpid. 
Men whose occupation is directly dependent upon plants, as farmers and 
gardeners, do little through the winter, or change their work. 

Solar and Civil Days. — The rotation and revolution of the 
earth furnish two units for reckoning time, the day and the 
year. The period from the moment when the sun reaches his 
highest point in the heavens and is on the meridian, to the 
moment when he next reaches the same point, varies from day 
to day. The average length of this period is divided into the 
hours, minutes, and seconds shown by ordinary clocks and 
watches. For convenience the ordinary or civil day is made 
to begin and end at midnight, and is of the same length in every 
part of the world. Inside the polar circles the civil day does not 
always correspond to actual day and night, since the time from 
sunrise to sunset varies from a few minutes to six months. 

If the earth's face were plane, sunrise, noon, and sunset would each 
occur over every part of it at the same moment, but as the spheroidal earth 
rotates, sunrise, noon, and sunset travel continuously westward at the 
rate of 15 degrees of longitude every hour. When it is noon at Greenwich 
it is about 7.00 a.m. at New York, 6.00 at St. Louis, 5.00 at Denver, and 
4.00 at San Francisco. So each meridian has its own sun time, slower 
and earlier than the meridians east of it, faster and later than those west 



i6 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



of it. The longitude of any place may be measured by the difference of 
time between it and Greenwich, one degree for every four minutes. 

Standard Time. — For people who stay at home their own 
local mean sun time is the most convenient; but for travelers, 
and especially for railroad companies, it is advantageous to 




Fig. 8. — Standard time belts of the United States. 

adopt standard meridians 15 , or one hour, apart, and to use 
the time of each meridian over a certain area on each side of it. 
In North America five standard time belts are in use: Atlantic 
or 60th meridian time (four hours slower than Greenwich time), 
Eastern or 75th meridian time, Central or 90th meridian time, 
Mountain or 105th meridian time, and Pacific or 120th meridian 
time. The boundaries of these belts are irregular. When a 
traveler crosses the boundary of a time belt, he sets his watch 
forward, or back, one hour. Nearly all civilized countries have 
adopted standard time meridians. 

International Date Line. — If one travels westward, sun time becomes 
slower at the rate of one hour for every 15 degrees of longitude, and in 
going around the earth a watch must be set back, in all, 24 hours, which 
would cause the traveler to lose one day from his calendar. If he travels 



EARTH, SUN, AND MOON 



17 



eastward, sun time grows faster at the same rate, and a watch must be 
set ahead to correspond. Thus one would add a day to his calendar. 
Hence it is found necessary to fix upon an arbitrary line for the correction 
of the calendar. This is called the international date line, and for all 
vessels is the meridian of 180 . Whenever a ship crosses this line to the 
westward, a day is added to the reckoning, but if to the eastward, a day 
is dropped from it. 

The Calendar. — The calendar now in use in most of the 
civilized world was adopted by Pope Gregory XIII in 1582. 
The earth completes one revolution around the sun in 365 d. 5 h. 
48 m. 46 s. The calendar is made to agree approximately with 
the solar year by having three successive years of 365 days each 
and then a leap year of 366 days. An extra day added every 
fourth year is a little too much, and therefore century years, 
like 1900 and 2000, are leap years only when divisible by 400. 

The Moon, Month, and Week. — The division of the year 
into months and weeks was originally suggested by the changes 




(EARTH) 



. FIRST ^earthA third 

'QUARTER ^cnrciny QUARTER 



FIRST /earth! THIRD 

QUARTER I "Kin 1 QUARTER^ 



J 
MOON 

Phases as seen from above moon's orbit. 



y 



o ™^ c 

MOON 

Phases as seen from the earth. 



Fig. 9. 



of the moon. The moon revolves around the earth from west 
to east in about 29! days. When it is between the earth and 



1 8 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

the sun the dark side is turned toward us and is called new moon 
(Fig. 9). About a week later half of the lighted side is visible 
and is called first quarter. When the moon is on the opposite 
side of the earth from the sun its lighted side is turned toward 
us and is called full moon. Then again, about a week later, half 
the lighted side is visible and is called last quarter. The inter- 
vals between these changes are variable, but average about seven 
days. The calendar weeks and months do not coincide with 
the periods or phases of the moon, and the number of days in 
successive months varies in an arbitrary and irregular manner. 

The year is naturally divided by the solstices and equinoxes into four 
seasons: spring, March 21 to June 22, 93 days; summer, June 22 to Sep- 
tember 23, 93 days; autumn, September 23 to December 22, 90 days; win- 
ter, December 22 to March 21, 89 or 90 days. Although the Gregorian 
calendar is imperfectly adjusted to the natural time periods of day, week, 
month, and year, any change in it would cause so much disturbance and 
confusion as to make it undesirable, if not impossible. 

Maps and Map Projections. — The special means of expression 
in geography is the map, because a map shows the facts of dis- 
tribution better than anything else can. A map is a drawing 
which shows the position, direction, distance, and area of objects 
upon a horizontal plane, as though a portion of the earth's sur- 
face were stripped off, spread out flat, and reduced in size. The 
one thing essential for a good map is that the position of every 
feature shown be located correctly; if this is done, the direc- 
tions, distances, and areas will be correct. No absolutely cor- 
rect map of any portion of the earth's surface can be drawn, 
because it is impossible to flatten a spherical surface into a 
plane surface without distorting it. 

The indispensable basis and guide in the construction of a map is the 
network of parallels and meridians. Numerous projections or plans for 
drawing the parallels and meridians are in common use. Some show the 
forms more correctly than others, some distort forms for the sake of show- 
ing areas correctly, while others are very erroneous as to forms and areas 
but correct as to directions. The best maps for common use are designed 
to show forms, areas, and directions with as little error as possible. 



MAPS AND MAP PROJECTIONS 



19 



The orthographic projection (Fig. 10) is a picture of a globe as it appears 
from a distance many times its diameter. Straight parallel lines, projected 
through the parallels and meridians of the globe upon a plane surface per- 
pendicular to them, locate the network of the map. Such a map is correct 
near the center, but around the edges the areas are greatly reduced. 




Fig. 10. — Orthographic projection. 



Fig. 11. — Stereographic projection. 



The stereo graphic projection (Fig. 11) is a picture of a transparent hemi- 
sphere as it would appear to the eye placed at the middle point of the 
surface of the opposite hemisphere. 
In this map the areas are reduced 
near the center and enlarged to- 
ward the edges. 

The globular projection 
(Fig. 1 2) is a picture of a trans- 
parent hemisphere as it would 
appear to the eye placed at a 
distance 1.707 times the radius 
of the sphere from its center. 
In this map the parallels along 
any meridian and the meridi- 
ans along any parallel are very 
nearly equidistant. It shows Kg " "—Globular projection, 

both form and area with less error than any other projection, and 




20 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 




is especially advantageous for maps of the hemispheres used in 
teaching. 

In the cylindrical projection the surface of the sphere is con- 
ceived to be that of a cylinder of the same diameter, cut length- 
wise and flattened out. 
The meridians are straight, 
parallel, and equidistant. 
If the parallels are pro- 
jected stereographically, 
the length of the cylinder 
is twice the diameter of the 
sphere (Fig. 13^4), and areas 
are increasingly exagger- 

Fig. 13 —Cylindrical projections. ated toward the poles. 

Mercator's projection (Figs. 13 B and 14) is cylindrical, but the 
parallels are so spaced that the degrees of latitude are propor- 
tional to the degrees of longitude. It is the only projection on 
which directions are abso- 
lutely correct, and hence it is 
much used by sailors. It is 
the best for maps of winds 
and ocean currents in which 
true directions are required. 
Cylindrical projections have 
the advantage of showing all 
the more important parts of 
the earth upon one contin- 
uous sheet, but on account 
of the enormous exaggeration 
and distortion cf areas in the 

higher latitudes, they should Fi S- 14.— Mercator's projection. 

never be used in teaching children and should always be corrected 
by reference to a globe. 

Mollweide's equal-area projection (Fig. 16) shows the whole 
face of the earth upon one continuous sheet, one hemisphere in 




MAPS AND MAP PROJECTIONS 



21 



the center and half of the other on each side. Near the cen- 
ter forms are but slightly distorted and distances are nearly 
correct. In the marginal portions distortion is considerable, 
and north-south distances are exaggerated; but this projection 
has the advantage of show- 
ing areas correctly. Hence 
it is used for maps in which 
a comparison of areas is im- 
portant. 

In the conical projection 
(Fig. 15) the surface repre- 
sented is conceived to be that 
of a cone cut lengthwise and 
flattened out. The parallels Fig. 15.— conical projection, 

are arcs of equidistant, concentric circles, and the meridians are 
radiating straight lines intersecting the parallels at right angles. 
For areas of no great extent in latitude, such as the United States, 
a map on this projection is very nearly correct. 

Map Scales. — The scale of a map is the ratio which distances and areas 
on the map bear to the actual distances and areas on the earth. Scales 
are expressed by ratios, as 1 : 1,000,000, which means that one inch on 
the map corresponds to one million inches on the earth; or in linear units, 
as 1 inch = 1 mile; or by graduated lines. For small areas the scale may 
be large, one foot or more to the mile; for large areas it must be small. On 
maps of large areas no uniform scale can apply exactly to all parts. 




RELIEF O] 

(Aft 




DEPTHS 

to 6C0 £t. 

6G0 ft. to 13,100 ft. 

13,100 ft. to 19,700 ft. 

Below 19,700 ft. 



iRTH CRUST 

lartonne) 




HEIGHTS 

Below Sea Level to 990 ft. above 
990 ft. to 3,300 ft. 
3,300 ft. to 13,100 it. 
Above 13,100 ft. 



CHAPTER II 

THE PLAN OF THE EARTH 

The Earth Crust. — If the water were out of the way so 
that the whole surface of the earth crust could be seen, two 
contrasted areas would appear. One third of it is a broad, 
irregular, elevated table or platform, roughened by mountains, 
plateaus, hills, and valleys. The rest of it is a steep-sided, 
smooth-bottomed depression, lying about 2§ miles below the 
elevated surface. The elevated area is the continental platform, 
and the depressed area is the oceanic basin. The highest point 
known (Mt. Everest in central Asia) is 29,000 feet above sea level, 
and the lowest point known (Planet Deep, near the Philippine 
Islands, western Pacific Ocean) is 32,078 feet below sea level. 
The difference or range of elevation is about 11^ miles. 

This is only one seven-hundredth part of the diameter of the solid earth, 
and if represented upon a globe seven feet in diameter would be about 
one eighth of an inch. The earth crust is much smoother in proportion 
to its size than the skin of an orange. 

The Margin of the Continental Platform. — The sea water not 
only fills the oceanic basin full, but also spreads out over the 
lower part of the continental platform until the outer edge of 
the platform is about 660 feet under water. The continents 
and large islands all stand upon the platform and are bordered 
by a belt of shallow water (Fig. 16). The lowlands less than 
660 feet above water, and the adjacent continental shelf less 
than 660 feet under water, constitute an unstable portion of 
the earth crust which has risen and sunk many times. Where 
the slope is so gentle, slight movements up or down make great 
changes in the outlines and area of the land. 

24 



THE PLAN OF THE EARTH 25 

If the crust should rise 660 feet, the shore line would recede to the 
outer edge of the shelf and the total land area would be increased about 
20 per cent. If the crust should sink 660 feet, the shore line would advance 
upon the land and about 30 per cent of the present land area would be 
flooded by the sea. Much greater up-and-down movements than these 
have occurred in the past. Rivers carry down the waste of the land and 
deposit it upon the continental shelf, spreading out material for the rock 
strata of new lands which may sometime rise from the sea. The shallow 
waters of the shelf are the home of abundant plant and animal life, and the 
site of the great fishing grounds of the world. Because of the shallowness 
tides rise higher along the shores than they do in deep water, and make it 
possible for large ships to reach ports like Montreal, Glasgow, and London, 
situated far up the bays and rivers. The relations of the continental shelf 
to the land and its inhabitants are far closer than those of the deep ocean 
basins. 

Arrangement of the Great Crust Features. — The continental 
platform which supports the great land masses forms a nearly 
continuous belt around the earth at about 70 N. Lat. (Fig. 16). 
From this belt three arms extend southward, the American to 
about 57 S. Lat., the Eurafrican to about 37 S. Lat., and 
the Asia-Australian to about 45 S. Lat. An Antarctic con- 
tinent of undefined extent surrounds the south pole. The 
oceanic basin forms a continuous belt around the earth at 
about 6o° S. Lat., from which three arms extend northward, 
interlocking with the continental arms. Of these the Pacific 
basin is roughly circular in outline, the Atlantic arm is long, 
narrow, and S-shaped, while the Indian arm is short and 
broadly triangular. The Arctic basin occupies an area around 
the north pole, the limits of which are not accurately known. 
Each continental arm is broken nearly midway of its length by 
a cross projection of the oceanic basin, the American by the 
Gulf of Mexico and Caribbean Sea, the Eurafrican by the Medi- 
terranean Sea, and the Asia-Australian by the straits of the 
Indian archipelago. 

Land and Water Hemispheres. — About 70 per cent of the land lies 
north of the equator and about 58 per cent of the sea lies south of it. If 
a map of a hemisphere is drawn with London as a center, it will include 



26 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



about 82.5 per cent of all the land, and the opposite hemisphere with its 
center near New Zealand will include about 63 per cent of all the sea. The 
land hemisphere thus drawn is 46.7 per cent land, and the water hemisphere 
is 90 per cent sea (Figs. 17 and 18). 




Fig. 17. Fig. 18. 

The Arrangement of Land Masses. — The continental land 
masses conform roughly to the position and shape of the con- 
tinental platform and are thus divided into seven continents, 

Europe, Asia, and North 
America lying close together in 
the northern hemisphere; South 
America, Africa, Australia, and 
Antarctica lying wholly or partly 
in the southern hemisphere, and 
more widely separated from one 
another. 

If a globe is viewed in such a posi- 
tion that the center of Asia (E. Long. 
90 , N. Lat. 50°) is the center of 
the visible hemisphere (Fig. 19), it 
will be seen that the other continents 
are arranged around Asia with some 
approach to symmetry. Europe is but a large peninsula projecting west- 
ward. Africa lies close against the southwestern shores of Eurasia, and 




Fig. 19. 



THE PLAN OF THE EARTH 27 

is tied to it by the Isthmus of Suez and the shelf at the mouth of the Red 
Sea. Directly northward of Asia, across the narrow polar basin, lies North 
America, connected by the shelf of Bering Sea and Strait. To the east 
of south the submarine platform of the Malay archipelago stretches away 
to Australia. In past ages America and Australia have been connected 
with Asia, and Africa with Europe, by land bridges, and to-day every part 
of the continental lands except Antarctica can be reached from Asia with- 
out crossing a strait more than 250 miles wide. The central position of 
Asia and the continuity of the radiating arms of the continental platform, 
furnishing easy routes of travel to nearly all habitable lands, have been 
of great importance in controlling the migration and dispersal of plants, 
animals, and men. There would be no insuperable difficulty in building 
a continuous railroad from Cape Horn to the Cape of Good Hope, with 
branch lines to Liverpool and Lisbon, while Australia could be connected 
with the system by a short ocean ferry. 

Eastern and Western Hemispheres. — The earth has been 
somewhat arbitrarily divided into an Eastern and a Western 
Hemisphere. In the Eastern Hemisphere Europe, Asia, and 
Africa compose the "Old World"; in the Western Hemi- 
sphere North and South America are called the " New World." 
There is no reason to think that any part of the land of the Old 
World is actually older than some parts of the New World. 
The human species probably originated in Asia, and the earliest 
records of human history are found in Asia and Africa, but 
Australia was not discovered by Europeans until 100 years 
after the discovery of America by Columbus. Asia and Europe 
form physically one continuous land mass and are often treated 
as one continent under the name of Eurasia, but for historic 
reasons geographers usually regard them as distinct. 

Northern and Southern Continents. — The continents natu- 
rally fall into two groups which are strongly contrasted in physical 
characters, in their relations to plant and animal life, and in the 
part they play in human history. About four fifths of the area 
of the northern continents lies in those temperate latitudes which 
are most favorable for the development of human faculties; 
while about four fifths of the area of the southern continents 
lies in the hot belts, between the parallels of latitude 30 north 



28 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

and south, where the climate is oppressive and plants and 
animals are either absent on account of aridity, or are able on 
account of humidity to compete successfully with man in the 
struggle for possession. The southern continents are isolated 
from the northern and from one another and are relatively in- 
accessible. They contain less than one eighth of the world's 
population. Consequently they are in their human relations, 
as well as in their physical conditions, subordinate appendages 
of the great northern land masses. 

Asia. — The central and largest continent spreads a vast 
expanse from the equator far into the polar regions, too shapeless 
to suggest any geometrical figure. The eastern side presents 
to the Pacific a belt of mountainous peninsulas and off-shore 
islands, which border the shelf for 6,000 miles. The southern 
margin is cut by deep notches into three massive peninsulas. 
On the west it is imperfectly separated from Europe by the 
Black and Caspian basins, and other depressions which once 
connected them with the Arctic Ocean. On the north low plains 
slope gently to the icy sea. The body of the continent consists 
of a mass of plateaus and mountains, the loftiest in the world, 
the culminating core of which is Tibet. 

From the Tibetan center, highlands trend southeastward toward Aus- 
tralia, northeastward toward America, westward into Europe, and south- 
westward into Africa. The average elevation of Asia is 3,120 feet, 25 per 
cent of it is below 660 feet, and 14 per cent is above 6,600 feet. Asia 
contains 30 per cent of all the land and more than half of all the people on 
the globe. 

Europe, a westward projection from Asia between the Arctic 
Ocean and the Mediterranean Sea, is characterized by many 
peninsulas and inclosed seas, which penetrate far into the in- 
terior. These give it the longest coast line in proportion to 
its area of all the continents, and furnish unequaled facilities 
for travel and trade by water. The highlands of Asia are pro- 
longed through southern Europe by less lofty ranges of folded 
mountains to the shores of the Atlantic. These are flanked by 



THE PLAN OF THE EARTH 20. 

plateaus and lesser ranges of moderate height. In the north- 
west the rugged peninsula of Scandinavia presents a bold front 
to the sea. The body of the continent is a low plain, no point 
of which is as much as 1,000 miles from the sea. 

The mean height of Europe is 990 feet, 57 per cent of it is below 660 feet, 
and less than 2 per cent is above 6,600 feet. Although it contains only 
6.7 per cent of the land, favorable conditions have made it the home of 
one fourth of the human race, and the dominant influence in modern 
civilization. 

North America is built on the triangular plan, with its longest 
side next to the Pacific, extending in a double curve more than 
6,000 miles, and bordered by the lofty Cordilleras. The con- 
tinental limits are extended far northward by the half-drowned, 
ragged land patches of the Arctic archipelago, to which is 
attached the largest of islands, Greenland. The southeastern 
side is paralleled for about half its length by the low Appalachian 
highland. The southern extremity tapers off into the crooked 
Isthmus of Panama, which connects it with South America. 
The body of the continent is made up of the largest continuous 
low plain in the world. It resembles Eurasia as the left hand 
resembles the right, presenting to the Atlantic a low and broken 
coast, penetrated on the south by the Mexican and Caribbean 
mediterranean, on the north by Hudson Bay, and between the 
two by drowned river valleys, all of which give access to the 
interior plains. 

Lying on the opposite side of the north Atlantic from Europe, and 2,000 
to 3,000 miles distant, North America has felt the influence of European 
civilization more strongly than any other land. Like Eurasia, it faces 
the Atlantic and presents to the Pacific a high and forbidding back. Its 
average elevation is 2,300 feet, 2>3 per cent of it is below 660 feet, and 6 per 
cent is above 6,600 feet. Its area is 16 per cent of the land, and its popu- 
lation 7.5 per cent of the inhabitants of the world. 

South America is a simplified copy of North America, re- 
sembling it in triangular form tapering southward, and in having 
a high western margin, low interior plains, and for the most part 
a low Atlantic coast. It is characterized by the smoothness of 



30 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

its coast line and the magnitude of its rivers, of which the Amazon 
is, in area of basin and volume of discharge, the largest in the 
world. 

Settlers have found it much more difficult to penetrate and occupy 
than North America, and its inhabitants, still largely of native Indian 
blood, are on the whole much less advanced in civilization. Its average 
elevation is 1,900 feet, 43 per cent is below 660 feet, and 9 per cent is 
above 6,600 feet. It contains 11 per cent of the land, and 2.4 per cent 
of the people of the world. 

Africa resembles the Americas in triangular outline, but is the 
most compact and unbroken of the continents. About 70 per 
cent of its surface is a plateau with steep margins. Although 
its northern coasts are in close touch with Eurasia and have 
shared in its history and civilization, the great desert of Sahara 
has been an almost impassable barrier to penetration from that 
side. On the east and west, deserts, dense forests, rapids and 
falls in the rivers, and an unhealthful climate, have combined to 
prevent occupation and to retard progress in culture. 

Its native peoples have remained for thousands of years in a condition 
of savagery which justifies the name of " the dark continent." Nearly 
every square mile of it is now under the influence and partial control of 
E'uropean people, and its future seems hopeful. Its average elevation is 
2,130 feet, 15.4 per cent is below 660 feet, and 2.4 per cent is above 6,600 
feet. It contains 20 per cent of the land area, and 8.6 per cent of the 
population of the world. 

Australia, including New Guinea and Tasmania, is a simplified 
copy of Africa, with the southern extension greatly reduced in 
size. Its surface is largely a dry plateau, with folded mountains 
on the east and north (in New Guinea). 

Isolated and cut off from the great centers of plant and animal life since 
early geologic times, all its indigenous inhabitants are of a very primitive 
type. On this account they offered little resistance to European colonists, 
who within the last century have taken complete possession of the habitable 
parts of the mainland. Its average elevation is 1,150 feet, 36 per cent is 
below 660 feet, and less than one per cent is above 6,600 feet. It now 
supports, on 6 per cent of the land area, one third of one per cent of the 
population of the world. 



THE PLAN OF THE EARTH 3 1 

Antarctica. — That there is an area of continental land around the 
south pole, about half as large again as Europe, seems now to be definitely 
settled, but it is so deeply buried in snow and ice that its outlines and sur- 
face are imperfectly known. Its average elevation is twice as great as that 
of any other continent. It is now in the twentieth century becoming a field 
for systematic exploration. On account of severity of climate and difficulty 
of approach, sojourn, and travel, the progress of discovery will be slow and 
costly. It contains no permanent human inhabitants, and little life of any 
kind, except sea birds which nest and breed upon its coasts. 

Islands. — Nearly all the large islands and many small ones 
stand upon the continental shelf and are therefore continental. 
Greenland, the Arctic archipelago, Newfoundland, and the 
Greater Antilles belong to North America; the British and 
Mediterranean islands to Europe; New Guinea and Tasmania 
to Australia; Ceylon, the Malay archipelago, the Philippines, 
Japan, Sakhalin, and Nova Zembla to Asia. Madagascar, New 
Zealand, Iceland, and perhaps Spitzbergen and Franz Josef 
Land occupy detached portions of the continental platform. 
The numerous small islands of the Pacific and some in other 
parts of the sea are the tops of submerged mountain ranges or 
volcanic peaks which rise from the deep sea floor, and are there- 
fore oceanic. 

Oceanic islands are of small area, isolated by wide stretches of deep 
water, and have little variety of resources. Consequently, they constitute 
an environment unfavorable for the development of the higher animals, 
including man. The part which they have played, or ever will play, in 
the life history of the globe is very small. 

Summary. — The principal features of the land relief of the 
globe consist of a nearly continuous belt of highland near the 
shores of the Pacific and Indian oceans, and wide areas of low- 
land bordering the Atlantic and Arctic oceans. Consequently 
nearly all the large rivers flow into the Atlantic and Arctic, 
Asia only contributing streams of the first class to the Pacific 
and Indian drainage. These facts account for the greater im- 
portance, in modern times, of the Atlantic and of the lands 
bordering upon it. 



CHAPTER III 

WORLD ECONOMY 

The earth is a sort of organism of which all the parts work 
together harmoniously like those of a plant or animal. No 
part of the earth is dead, but like a tree it is most active on the 
outside. Everything that goes on in the world is made possible 
by a multitude of conditions which probably do not exist in the 
same combination upon any other planet. 

The position of the earth — its distance from the sun — deter- 
mines the amount of heat which it receives. This is sufficient to 
maintain at all places upon the face of the earth a temperature 
which never falls lower than about 1 20 degrees below the freezing 
point of water (— 88° F.), and never rises higher than about 
120 degrees above the freezing point (i52°F.). This makes it 
possible for large quantities of water to exist in each of three 
forms — solid ice, liquid water, and gaseous vapor. 

The form of the earth determines the angle at which the nearly 
parallel rays of the sun strike its face at different latitudes, and 
consequently the amount of heat received per square mile. This 
gives a variety of temperatures, ranging from the torrid to the 
frigid. 

The attitude of the earth, or the inclination of its axis, in com- 
bination with its daily and yearly motions, determines a change 
of seasons, or variation of temperature, at all latitudes, and 
prevents both the constancy which would exist if the earth's 
axis were perpendicular to the plane of its orbit, and the excessive 
variation which would result if the axis were nearly parallel to 
that plane. 

The revolution of the earth around the sun at a nearly uniform 
speed in an orbit which is nearly circular brings about the regular 

32 



WORLD ECONOMY 33 

succession of seasons and years, each of which is of moderate 
length. The succession of warm and cool, or wet and dry, 
seasons gives to plants and animals alternating periods of com- 
parative rest and activity. 

The rotat'on of the earth upon its axis exposes the greater 
part of its face to alternations of heat and cold, light and dark- 
ness, at short intervals, and imposes upon living beings corre- 
spondingly short and frequent periods of activity and rest. It 
also enables men to look out at night into space, see the moon 
and stars, and learn something of the universe of which the 
planet earth forms an insignificant part. 

The structure of the earth includes solid, liquid, and gaseous 
spheres. The size and weight of the solid sphere largely deter- 
mine the force of gravity, which is sufficient to prevent the 
atmosphere from escaping into space and to give it such com- 
position and density as to support plant and animal life. The 
attraction of the earth also determines the weight of every 
object upon its face, and the strength or rigidity of plants and 
the muscular power of animals are nicely adapted to support or 
to move their own and other weights. The earth crust gives a 
firm support for all creatures which live upon the land, and to 
plants soil for anchorage and a storehouse of available food. 
The depressions in it form basins which hold most of the water 
and prevent it from covering the crust completely. Although 
the form and surface of the crust are continually changing, the 
changes are slow, and the crust is relatively the most fixed and 
stable part of the earth outside the core. 

Circulating Systems. — In contrast with the rigidity of the 
crust, the fluid masses of water and air are very mobile and make 
it possible for extensive systems of currents to circulate in the 
atmosphere, in the sea, and on the land. 

The air is seldom, if ever, perfectly still. Driven by the heat of the 
sun, it is rising, or settling, or moving horizontally in broad streams which 
cover thousands of miles and extend around the earth. The whole mass 
is whirling in great spirals from equator to poles and back again, forming 



34 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

a planetary wind system, analogous to the circulation of blood in animals. 
Driven by the winds, the surface waters of the ocean are in perpetual 
motion, drifting around and across the basins. The water of the sea 
evaporates, mingles with the air, spreads over the land, falls as rain or 
snow, and runs back again into the sea, completing a third circuit. The 
land is attacked by the air, worn away by the water, and carried into the 
sea. The water penetrates the earth crust and, circulating through it, dis- 
solves, deposits, and concentrates metallic ores and other minerals, some- 
times bringing them to the surface in mineral springs and geysers. Thus 
the earth has four great circulatory systems, active in its solid as well as 
its fluid parts, which keep its materials in motion and make its face to 
undergo perpetual change. 

The water supplies plants and animals with food and also 
with a circulating fluid which distributes new material to their 
tissues and brings away waste. The air supplies plants with 
carbon which forms the bulk of their food, and both plants and 
animals with oxygen which they breathe and by which they 
maintain the chemical changes upon which life depends. The 
air penetrates to the bottom of the sea and makes the whole 
mass of water habitable by millions of living forms. 

Solar Energy. — The sun shines down through the atmosphere 
and into the water, and its light, heat, and chemical rays furnish 
the power or energy which keeps things moving and alive upon 
the face of the earth. 

The air and water absorb and retain the heat of the sun, tempering its 
intensity by day, preventing its too rapid escape by night, and maintaining 
over nearly the whole face of the earth such a temperature as plants and 
animals require. Not far below lies the fervent heat of the interior, and 
not far above, the intense cold of stellar space. 

The Plan of the earth presents a vast expanse of water broken 
at intervals by large and small masses of land. While the land 
masses predominate in the northern hemisphere, their longer 
axes extend north and south through so many degrees of latitude 
as to traverse all the zones of climate. This variety is made 
still greater by diversities of elevation, relief, and distance from 
the sea. The number and variety of living forms probably 
decrease from near sea level downward to the deep sea floor and 



WORLD ECONOMY 35 

upward to the mountain tops, but the great expanse of sea surface 
and the low average elevation of the land make a very large 
proportion of the face of the earth available for a dense popula- 
tion of some kind. The arrangement and variety of situation, 
relief, soil, and climate have brought about a corresponding variety 
of living forms, each adapted to the peculiar set of conditions 
under which it lives. Probably no large part of the sea or land 
is entirely devoid of life ; but the sphere of life is strictly confined 
to the thin shell of the earth where land, water, and air inter- 
mingle. 

Human Life. — The most important and interesting thing 
about the earth is the fact that men live upon it. So far as we 
know this is the only human planet. Man was originally a land 
animal, and upon the land a large majority of human beings will 
always live. But using the land as a base, man has extended his 
field of activity over the sea and into the lower atmosphere. 

He requires a constant supply of oxygen from the air, and a supply of 
food at short intervals, which he gets from plants, animals, and water. He 
must also maintain his body at a constant temperature, which he does 
by the consumption of food on the inside and the use of clothing, shelter, 
and artificial heat on the outside. For clothing, building materials, and 
fuel he is again dependent upon plants, animals, and rocks. He could not 
live many minutes upon the moon, which has no soil, water, air, or vege- 
tation. From the natural resources of the earth he has learned to obtain 
much more than the bare necessities of life, which he shares with other 
animals. He has learned to satisfy his ever-growing wants for safety, 
comfort, and luxury, and to gratify his hunger for knowledge, his taste for 
beauty, his love of social enjoyment, and his longing for the things which 
he finds most valuable. 

Geography has something to say about all these things, and 
seeks to understand how they have come to be where and what 
they are. It studies the world organism and tries to discover 
how men can live in it and lead so many different kinds of life 
as they do in different parts of it, what natural conditions help 
or hinder them, and how they may use the organism to better 
advantage in the future. 



CHAPTER IV 



THE LAND 



Structure. — The ground upon which we stand, walk, and 
work is a part of the earth crust, the outer shell or layer of the 
rock sphere. The crust contains hundreds of species of minerals, 

mixed together in differ- 
ent combinations to form 
rocks. A large mass of 
any solid mineral or mix- 
ture of minerals is called 
rock. Almost everywhere, 
except upon very steep 
slopes, the ground is com- 
posed of loose, incoherent 
material, commonly called 
earth or soil, and distin- 
guished as clay, sand, 
gravel, pebbles, boulders, 
or mixtures of them. 
They are all fragments of 
older rocks which have 
been broken up and de- 
composed. This sheet of 
loose, fragmentary mate- 
rial may be hundreds of 
feet thick, and is called mantle rock, because it overlies and covers 
the other rock. The upper foot or two of mantle rock is gen- 
erally mixed with humus, or decayed vegetable matter, and con- 
stitutes the soil, in the strict, or agricultural, sense of the word. 
Bed Rock. — If a boring is made anywhere down through 




Fig. 20. — Stratified sand and gravel, Terre Haute, 
Ind. 



THE LAND 



37 



the mantle rock, it will be found to be underlain by bed rock, 
a compact, coherent mass, which is not easily broken up or 
removed. Bed rock often projects through the cover of mantle 
rock and is exposed to view upon a hillside, in the face of a cliff, 
or along the bed and banks of a stream. Such an exposure of 
bed rock on the surface is called an outcrop. In most places the 
upper part of the bed rock is stratified, that is, it lies in distinct 
sheets or layers called strata (singular stratum). The common 




y-'.' ; ,J>/» ■ >:; 






;:.' ...,-."■•■ 




Fig. 21. — Stratified bed and mantle rock, Erie County, N. Y. 



kinds of stratified bed rock are shale, sandstone, conglomerate, 
and limestone. They are also called aqueous or sedimentary 
rocks, because they have been formed by the accumulation of 
sediment in bodies of water. 

In some places immediately beneath the mantle rock, and 
everywhere beneath the stratified bed rock, lies a mass of un- 
stratified rock, which owes its form and structure to cooling 
from a plastic or molten condition. 

Melted rock has risen from great depths and has cooled in the cracks 
and between the layers of stratified rock, or has escaped to the surface and 
spread out over the country. Rocks which have solidified from a molten 



38 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 




Fig. 22. — Unstratified igneous rock, Hoboken, N. J. (N.Y. Geol. Surv.) 

state are called igneous. Lava, of which there are many varieties, is a com- 
mon form of igneous rock. Some rocks which were originally sedimentary, 
have been changed by heat and pressure, but have not been melted, and 




Fig. 23. — Contorted gneiss, a metamorphic rock, near Hudson Bay. (Can. Geo]. Surv.) 



are called metamorphic or altered rocks. Igneous and metamorphic rocks 
are often distinguished as crystalline, because they are mainly or wholly 
composed of crystals, which are often conspicuous from their shape, color, 
and sparkling luster. Granite is a good example of crystalline rock. 



THE LAND 39 

Economic Relations. — The surface, soil, vegetation, and value 
of a region depend largely upon the kind of rock which underlies 
it. The common kinds of both mantle and bed rock are dug or 
quarried for use in constructing roads, streets, bridges, houses, 
and public buildings, while the finer kinds, like marble and 
granite, furnish beautiful material for buildings, monuments, 
and statues. All the useful minerals, such as coal and the ores 
of the metals, are obtained from the earth crust, generally from 
the bed rock by mining. Thus the agricultural and mineral 
wealth of a country depends upon the structure of the earth 
crust. 

Relief Maps. — Many devices are in use for showing elevation 
and form, or relief, upon a map. One of the most common 
and generally useful is by " overlaying " with different colors 
to show successive stages of height and depth, as on the map, 
Fig. 16. Such a map shows genera] elevation within certain 
limits, but fails to show the details of form. Each boundary 
line of a color or shade is level, or everywhere at the same dis- 
tance, 990 feet, 3,300 feet, etc., above or below sea level, measured 
vertically. These lines of equal elevation upon a map are called 
contour lines, or simply contours. By drawing contours at small 
intervals relief may be shown with any desired degree of pre- 
cision, and colors become unnecessary. 

The United States Geological Survey is making a topographic atlas of the 
United States, of which about two fifths is now completed. The contoured 
maps in this book, Figs. 28, 30, 31, 35, etc., are taken from it. They show 
the relief, drainage, and culture or human features, such as towns, houses, 
and roads, with great detail and precision. It is worth while to learn to use 
these maps, which are among the best made of any country in the world. 

Fig. 24 shows a sketch or picture of a landscape, and Fig. 25 a contoured 
map of the same region. In the foreground is a portion of the sea, the 
shore line of which forms the basal or zero contour. Contours are drawn 
upon the map at intervals of fifty feet measured vertically from the sea level, 
and they mark the fines where the seashore would be if the sea should rise 
fifty, one hundred, etc., feet. Where the slope is steep, one would have to 
travel only a short distance to rise fifty feet; hence the contours are close 
together. Where the slope is gentle, one would have to travel far to rise 



40 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



fifty feet; hence the contours are farther apart. By shortening the con- 
tour interval to ten or five feet, as may be done upon a large-scale map, 
the elevation of every point may be shown very precisely. For showing 




Fig. 24. 




Fig. 25. 



exact elevation no device is equal to the contoured map; but it has the 
disadvantage of not being graphic, that is, of not being understood by 
everybody at a glance. 

A very common device for showing relief upon a map is the use of 
hachures, or fine lines running up and down the slopes, and so drawn as to 
show the steepness of the slope by the depth of shading. Hachured maps 
may be made very graphic and almost equal to a picture. Figs. 26 and 27 
show the relation between contoured and hachured maps of the same area. 
A combination of the two is the best possible method of showing relief upon 
a map. 



THE LAND 



41 





Fig. 26. — Contoured map. 



Fig. 27. — Hachured map. 



Land Forms. — The surface of the land presents a variety of 
forms which differ widely in outline, elevation, slope, mass, and 
structure. The inequalities of surface found in any region con- 
stitute its vertical relief. A smooth, level plain might be said 
to have in itself no relief, but if it stands at a higher level 
than some adjoining land or water surface, it would have relief 
in relation to the lower surface. 

The design upon a coin stands out in relief above the general surface of 
the metal. If the elevations , are low and the depressions shallow, the sur- 
face has low relief ; if the elevations are high and the depressions deep, the 
surface has high or strong relief. In common speech the roughness of the 
country means about the same as relief. 

The large and controlling features of land relief are plains, 
plateaus, mountains, hills, and valleys. The internal forces of 
the earth have raised some portions of the land and depressed 
other portions, producing plains, plateaus, and mountains which 
mark the main features of the design. External forces, acting 
chiefly through air and water, have roughened a large part of 
the surface into an intricate pattern of smaller features, including 
ridges, valleys, hills, hollows, mesas, and basins. 

Plains. — Plains, or lowlands, are broad, smooth, gently 
sloping tracts of land not far above sea level. The borders of a 
plain may be sharply defined by the abrupt slopes of a mountain 




Fig. 28. — Coastal plain, drowned valley, barrier beach, and lagoon, New Jersey. 

42 




Scale about i mile per inch. Contour interval 10 feet. (Barnegat Sheet, U.S.G.S.) 

43 



44 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

range, or they may rise by an almost imperceptible grade to the 
height of a plateau, or slope gently to and beneath the waters 
of the sea. Plains are generally overspread with a deep layer of 
mantle rock brought down from higher land by streams,- glaciers, 
and winds, or produced by the decay of the bed rock underneath. 
Structural Plains. — The flatness of the great low plains of 
the world is due to various causes. Most plains are underlain 
by sedimentary rocks, the strata of which have not been much 
disturbed from their originally horizontal position. The surface 
is flat because the strata beneath it lie flat. When the surface 
thus conforms to the structure of the earth crust, the plain is 
called structural. It is like the cover of a closed book (Fig. 36). 

The best examples of the structural plain are found in the lowlands which 
border the coasts of the continents, and are called coastal plains (Fig. 28). 
They are generally narrow, but sometimes, as in the case of the plains 
along the Atlantic and Gulf coasts of the United States, they stretch back 
hundreds of miles to the plateau or mountains which lie behind them. 
Coastal plains are formed by the slow rising of the sea bottom until it 
emerges from the water. They are covered with layers of imperfectly con- 
solidated sediment which has been brought down in previous ages from 
older lands and deposited offshore. They are continuous with the sub- 
merged plain of the continental shelf. They are usually the latest addi- 
tions to the continent and are composed of materials recently deposited; 
hence such lands are young in every sense. Old coastal plains sometimes 
occur in the interior of the continents, far from the sea. They were formed 
in the same way as the others, along the shore of a sea which has long 
since disappeared, and are now far inland because other plains and even 
mountains have risen between them and the present coast line. A strip 
of country extending from Wisconsin to New York along the south side of 
the Great Lakes is an old coastal plain. The most extensive plains in the 
world occur in the interior of continents, as in North America, South 
America, and Eurasia. These are for the most part structural plains, 
underlain by nearly horizontal strata. 

Worn-down Plains. — Some large plains owe their flatness 
and low elevation to erosion. Once high and rough, they have 
been worn down by weathering and the work of streams and 
glaciers to a nearly even surface not far above sea level. Such 



THE LAND 45 

plains are seldom as smooth as coastal plains, but are studded 
with low, rounded hills, composed of materials less easily eroded 
than the rest. They are called worn-down plains, peneplains, 
or plains of degradation (Figs. 29, 30). 

A large U-shaped area surrounding Hudson Bay, from Labrador to the 
Arctic Ocean, was once occupied by a mountain range which has been 
worn down to its very roots. It is composed largely of igneous and met- 
amorphic rocks which must have been formed originally far below the 



Fig. 29. — Stereogram of a worn-down plain. (Wis. Geol. Surv.) 
Complex structure shown in section on the edges. 

surface, and have been exposed by the removal of the rocks which once 
covered them (Figs. 2$, in). The structure is complex, that is, masses of 
different kinds of rock lie mingled together in almost every possible shape 
and position, and the present surface cuts across them without any con- 
formity to their shapes and positions. This region is called the Laurentian 
peneplain. A similar plain in northern Europe occupies Finland, Lapland, 
and Sweden. Such plains are among the oldest lands on the globe, because 
it has required millions of years to wear them down to their present form 
and height. 

Alluvial Plains. — Many plains, usually of less extent than 
those already described, have been formed by the spreading out 
of sheets of mantle rock over a surface previously more or less 




Fig. 30. — Worn-down plain, Georgia and South Carolina. Scale about 2 miles per inch. 

Contour interval 5° feet. (Crawfordville Sheet, U.S.G.S.) 

46 




Fig. 31. — Alluvial plain, Wabash River, Indiana and Illinois. Scale about 2 miles per inch. 
Contour interval 20 feet. (Patoka Sheet, U.S.G.S.) 

47 



4« 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 




Fig. 32. — Alluvial plain, Wabash River, near Terre Haute, Ind. 

uneven. A large river, more or less along its whole course, but 
especially toward its mouth, gets out of its banks in times of 
high water, spreads over the adjoining country, and deposits a 
coat of mud or sand, thus building up a smooth surface known 





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Fig. 33. — Lake plain, Clearwater, Minn. Outlet in the distance. 



THE LAND 



49 



as a flood plain (Figs. 31, 32, 75, 76). When it enters the sea all 
its remaining load of sediment is dropped and the flood plain 
is built out into the water, forming a delta (Fig. 69). Plains 
thus made by the accumulation of river sediment are called 
alluvial. The alluvial plains of the Mississippi, Amazon, Ganges, 
Nile, and Hoang are among the largest in the world. 

Lake Plains. — -All streams which flow into a lake carry and deposit 
sediment until in time the lake basin may be filled up and converted into 
an almost perfectly level lake plain or lacustrine plain (Fig. 33). The famous 
wheat-growing district of Minnesota, North Dakota, and Manitoba is the 
bed of an old glacial lake. 

Glacial Plains. — In North America and Europe millions of 
square miles have been covered by moving ice sheets, which, as 




Fig. 34. — Glacial plain, Laporte County, Ind. 



they melted, deposited vast sheets of mantle rock called glacial 
drift, of such thickness as to fill up, bury, and smooth over the 
irregularities of the bed-rock surface. The nearly level surface 
thus produced is called a glacial plain (Figs. 34, 35). 

Alluvial, glacial, and lacustrine plains may be grouped together 
as plains of accumulation or aggradation. 

Eolian Plains. — In regions of small rainfall and scant vege- 
tation the loose mantle rock is lifted and drifted about by the 
winds, and some of it is carried entirely out of the region and 




Fig. 35. — Glacial plain and cliff coast, Illinois. Scale about i mile per inch. 

Contour interval 10 feet. (Highwood Sheet, U.S.G.S.) 

So 




Fig. 36. — Portion of the Great Plains, Colorado. Scale about 2 miles per inch. Contour 
interval 25 feet. Irrigation canal near 4000 foot contour. (Las Animas Sheet, U.S.G.S.) 

Si 



52 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



deposited over neighboring lands or in the sea. This process, 
long continued, produces a worn-down plain, studded with knobs 
of resistant rock, and its level may be degraded even below that 
of the sea. 

The Kalahari desert in South Africa owes its relief to this cause, and 
may be called a wind-worn plain. The material carried away from a 
wind-worn plain may accumulate upon neighboring lands in such quan- 




: ':. ,'.. 







Fig. 37. — Wind-worn plain, Algerian Sahara. (Schimper, Plant-Geography.) 

titles as to bury them hundreds of feet deep under a mantle of fine dust. 
In China thousands of square miles are covered with a material called 
loess, which has been blown from the dry plateaus of central Asia. Both 
the wind-worn plains and those made by the deposition of wind-blown dust 
are called eolian plains (Figs. 37, 141, 142). 

Economic Relations. — On account of their accessibility, fer- 
tility, and mild climate, plains have ever been the most densely 
populated parts of the earth. It is probable that 75 per cent 
of the human race live less than 1,000 feet above the sea. The 
wealthiest and most highly civilized peoples of the world live 
on the plains, and there nearly all the great cities have sprung 



THE LAND 



53 



up. The most favored countries are those which possess broad 
plains traversed by great rivers and bordering upon the sea. 

Alluvial, glacial, and lacustrine plains, on account of depth and fertility 
of soil, are the best agricultural regions in the world. Coastal plains are 
usually less productive. Worn-down plains are often infertile on account 
of lack of soil, but they sometimes support forests which yield valuable 
timber and swarm with fur-bearing animals, as in the Laurentian region of 
Canada. They are apt to be rich in mineral wealth, because long-con- 
tinued erosion has laid bare veins of ore once deeply buried. The iron and 
copper mines of the Lake Superior region, the silver, cobalt, and nickel 
mines north of Lake Huron, and the diamond deposits of South Africa 
occur in worn-down plains. Eolian plains are generally deserts, not on 
account of poor soil, but because they occur only in regions where the rain- 
fall is very scanty. 

^Plateaus.- — Plateaus are broad masses of elevated land. 
They are high plains, and there is no fixed and definite line of 
demarcation between 
plains and plateaus. 
It is sometimes con- 
venient to use 660 feet 
(200 meters), 1,000 
feet, or even 2,000 feet 
above the sea to limit 
the height of plains. 

In a region of low 
relief, a broad, massive 
elevation above 1,000 feet 
may be called a plateau, 
while in a region of high 
relief the name would be 

given only to a similar area above 2,000 feet. Plateaus may be as smooth 
and level as plains, as in the case of the Great Plains east of the Rocky 
Mountains, but are generally more broken (Figs. 36, 38). They are often 
bordered or traversed by mountain ranges. Low plateaus may be called 
uplands, and high plateaus highlands. 

Economic Relations. — On account of rougher surface, poorer 
soil, and colder and drier climate, plateaus are generally less 




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■'<^ rr - f- ^vf-^-'^sSis X-" 1 ? 



Fig. 38. — A plateau: Mesa Verde, Colorado. 



54 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



favorable for human occupation than plains. In middle lati- 
tudes, plateaus of moderate height, such as the Great Plains of 
the United States, and some of the plateaus of central Asia, 
constitute a region of steppes, covered with patches of grass, 
over which the people wander with their herds of horses, cattle, 
and sheep in search of pasture. Very high plateaus, such as 
Tibet, have an Arctic climate, and are almost uninhabitable. 
In tropical regions, plateaus such as those of Mexico, Peru, the 
Dekkan, and central Africa have a temperate climate, and are 
better homes for men than the hot and unhealthful plains 
which border them. 

Mountains. — Mountain ranges are long, narrow ridges of 
great height. They are usually due to the folding, crumpling, 
and breaking of the earth crust along lines of weakness (Figs. 39, 




Fig. 39. — Fold in the Jufa Mountains. (Robin, La Terre.) 



41, and frontispiece). They are characterized by complex 
structure, steep slopes, and sharp crests. The crest is cut by 
notches, or passes, into a series of peaks, which from a distance 
look like the teeth of a saw. The notches seldom extend halfway 
down to the base. Mountain ranges seldom occur singly, but 
usually many ranges extending in the same general direction 
form a mountain system. All mountains owe their height to up- 
heaval of the earth crust by internal forces, but their forms are 
due chiefly to erosion (Figs. 40, 44, 58, 60, 102, 103, 104, 105, 
106, 109). 




Fig. 40. — A portion of the Sierra Nevada, with glacial cirques and lakes, California. 
Scale about 2 miles per inch. Contour interval 100 feet. (Mt. Whitney Sheet, U.S.G.S.) 

55 




Fig. 41. — Folded rocks, Turkestan. (Carnegie Institution, Explorations in Turkestan.) 




Fig. 42.— Dissected plateau. Toe River. North Carolina. (U. S. G. S.) 




I 



Fig. 43. — Dissected plateau and cliff coast, California. Scale about 1 mile per inch. 
Contour interval 25 feet. (San Mateo Sheet, U.S.G.S.) 

57 



5 8 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

Plateaus are sometimes dissected by a network of valleys into a system 
of sharp ridges and peaks which resemble in form " a sea of mountains," 
and are not improperly called mountains, although dissected plateau would 
be a more exact descriptive name (Figs. 42, 43, 73). The elevations left 
on worn-down plains or plateaus, projecting like nail heads or knots in an 
old floor, may be of mountainous size, like the White Mountains of New 
Hampshire. Isolated mountains or peaks, not forming a part of a range, 
are always remnants left by erosion, or of volcanic origin. Some of the 
most famous mountains of the world belong to the latter class, as Vesuvius 
and Etna in Europe, Kilimanjaro and Kenia in Africa, and Shasta and 
Orizaba in North America (Figs. 51, 52, 53, 54). 

Economic Relations. — Mountains are difficult to penetrate, 
to cross, or to live on. They are formidable barriers to the 
migration of plants, animals, and men, and the inhabitants upon 
opposite sides of a mountain range are often very unlike. The 
vertical height and steepness of mountains render travel and 
transportation among them costly in effort and limited in amount. 
The use of vehicles is often impossible, and neither man nor 
beast can climb up and down with a heavy load. The soil upon 
mountain slopes is thin and poor, and there are large areas of 
bare rock. The climate of mountains is severe in proportion to 
their height, and the higher summits are covered with snow and 
ice. Agriculture is impossible except in the valleys. Moun- 
tains act as condensers of water vapor and have a heavier rainfall 
than the adjacent lowlands. * Most mountains are forested up to 
a certain height called the timber line. Where the forests have 
been burned or cut grasses nourish. . Hence mountaineers are 
usually lumbermen or herdsmen. The upheaval of a mountain 
range breaks up the earth crust and produces many cracks in 
which the ores of metals may be deposited by deeply circulating 
waters. The rapid erosion of mountains removes the cover and 
exposes the veins of ore upon the surface. Therefore many of 
the richest mines of gold, silver, copper, lead, and other minerals 
occur in mountainous regions. The permanent population of 
mountains is sparse. The people are rude, hardy, and active, 
because only such can make a living there, and luxuries are few. 



THE LAND 59 

They are free and liberty-loving because they can easily defend 
themselves against invaders. Conquered peoples may take refuge 
in the mountains, leaving the lowlands to be occupied by their 
more numerous conquerors. Towns and cities, such as Leadville 
and Cripple Creek in Colorado, sometimes spring up around a 
rich mine above the timber line, but the citizens are dependent 
upon the lowlands for everything they use. Mountain scenery is 
grand and picturesque, and the air is pure, invigorating, and in 
summer agreeable. Hence mountains are pleasure and health 
resorts for the people of the lowlands. 

The Alps have become the playground of Europe, and are visited by 
about a million people every season. Railroads, coach roads (Fig. 295). 
and hotels are constructed for their accommodation, and the inhabitants 
reap a rich harvest from their guests. 

Mountain streams have a rapid fall and constant volume which make 
them especially valuable for water power. As coal becomes more scarce 
and costly, manufacturers will seek water power to run their machinery, 
and mountainous countries, such as Switzerland, Italy, and Norway, may 
become great manufacturing countries. 

Mountains are great soil factories, where bed rock is rapidly broken up 
and carried away by streams to be deposited in their lower valleys. The 
rich and populous plains of the Po, the Rhone, the Rhine, and the Danube 
have been built up by the waste of the Alps. The soil of the alluvial plains 
of the Mississippi, the Amazon, the Ganges, and the Hoang has been brought 
from the mountains in which these rivers have their sources. 

Hills. — Hills are small elevations, and the distinction be- 
tween hills and mountains is indefinite. In a region of moderate 
relief, like Pennsylvania, ridges 1,000 feet high are called moun- 
tains, while in a region of great relief, like Colorado, ridges 
2,000 feet high are called hills. 

While all great mountain ranges owe their origin to disturb- 
ance and upheaval of the earth crust, most hills are due either 
to. the cutting out of the valleys between them, or to the heap- 
ing up of mantle rock by glaciers, ice sheets, and winds. 
Hence hills are of two classes, — hills of erosion and hills of. 
accumulation. 




Fig. 45. — Hills of accumulation, with basins, Wisconsin. Scale about 1 mile per inch. 

Contour interval 20 feet. (St. Croix Dalles Sheet, U.S.G.S.) 

61 



62 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 




Fig. 46. — Hills of erosion: Jacalitos Hills, California. (U.S.G.S.) 





Fig. 47. — Hills and hollows of glacial accumulation, Victor, N. Y. 

Hills vary in value according to their structure, size, and ruggedness. 
Sand hills are generally worthless, and if wind-drifted are destructive. 
Glacial hills may be as productive as plains, although less easy to culti- 
vate. Some hills are forested, and some furnish good pasturage. A hilly 
country is always picturesque and attractive for its beauty. It presents 
a pleasing variety of slope and situation in contrast with the monotonous 
sameness of the plains. 

Valleys. — Any depression between higher land on each side 
may be called a valley. Wherever parallel mountain ranges are 
upheaved, the corresponding depression between them is called 
an intermont valley. The Valley of California is an intermont 



THE LAND 



63 




Fig. 48. — Kettlehole basins, Naples, N. Y. 

valley between the Sierra Nevada on the east and the Coast 
Ranges on the west. Most valleys are long and narrow, but 
between hills and upon plains and plateaus there are many broad 
depressions, often occu- 
pied by lakes, which 
should be called hollows 
or basins. 

Valleys are the most com- 
mon of all relief forms, and 
most of them have been 
made wholly or partly by 
running water. That is a 
long story which will be told 
in some of the following 
chapters. 

Broken Block Lands. 

— Some regions resem- 
ble in relief a poorly laid 
pavement in which some 
of the bricks or tiles 
stand above or below the 
others. The earth crust 
has been broken by 
nearly vertical cracks into blocks which have been displaced, 
some upward and some downward, or tilted to one side. The 
cracks are called faults, and the process of displacement is 
faulting. The elevated blocks may form steep-sided table-lands, 




Fig. 49. — Faults. (U.S.G.S.) 

Block between faults has dropped down. 



6 4 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



or, if tilted, sharp-crested ridges. The depressed blocks may 
form basins or rift valleys, according to their shape. 

An area in Europe extending from central France to Hungary has been 
broken into many pieces, and faulted into a complex set of tables, ridges, 
and basins. The Mediterranean region is faulted on a very large scale. 
The Sierra Nevada of California is a faulted block, the eastern edge of 
which has been tilted up to form a very steep slope. Many of the moun- 
tain ranges of the Great Basin are tilted blocks. 




Fig. 50. — Cross section of rift valley. (Blackwelder and Barrows, Elements of Geology.) 

The subsidence of a long, narrow block between two parallel faults 
produces a rift valley, of which the valley of the Rhine from Basel to Bing- 
en is a good example. A rift valley on a grand scale extends frorn lakes 
Nyassa and Tanganyika, in Africa, through the Red Sea to the valley of 
the Dead Sea and the Jordan River in Asia, a distance of about 4,000 miles 
(Fig. 118). 

Volcanic Lands. — Cracks in the earth crust often permit the 
escape of melted rock, steam, and hot gases from the interior. 
When this takes place with violent explosions and a brilliant 
display of fireworks the event is a volcanic eruption. Enormous 
quantities of lava (melted rock) in the form of dust, sand, and 
cinders are thrown into the air and spread over the surrounding 
country. Streams of liquid lava flow from the vent and, grad- 
ually cooling and stiffening, help to build up a volcanic cone or 
mountain to a height, in some cases, of three or four miles. The 
vent of a volcano is called a pipe or chimney, and there is, 
usually, a cup-shaped depression, or crater, at the top. The 
immediate cause of an eruption is the sudden expansion of 
water in the lava into steam. The melted rock comes from 
great depths and its origin is not fully understood. Volcanic 
eruptions produce a peculiar relief characterized by conical or 
domed elevations, standing singly or in groups and lines and 




Fig. 51. — A volcanic cone: Mt. Shasta, California. Scale about 4 miles per inch. Contour 
interval 200 feet. (Shasta Sheet, U.S.G.S.) 

65 



66 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



Fig. 52. — Volcano, New Guinea. 

varying in height from a few hundred to many thousand feet 
(Fig- 53)- 

Most of the numerous 
oceanic islands have been 
built up by volcanic erup- 
tions in the bottom of 
the sea, and stand in 





Fig< 54- — Sundance Mountain, Wyoming. 
A dome of igneous rock. 



Fig. 53. — Volcanic domes: Puys of 
central France. 



lines along the course of sub- 
marine fissures. In India 
and in the states of Oregon, 
Idaho, and Washington, lava 
has flowed quietly from 
cracks and flooded hundreds 
of thousands of square miles 
to the depth of several thou- 



sand feet, building up a lava plateau with a smooth surface resembling 
that of the sea (Fig. 57). 



THE LAND 



6 7 



Economic Relations. — Volcanic eruptions are temporarily 
destructive to life and property. In 1902 an eruption of Mont 
Pelee in the island of Martinique, one of the West Indies, utterly 
destroyed St. Pierre, a city of 30,000 people, with its inhabitants, 
in a few minutes. Yet volcanic action is on the whole construc- 
tive rather than destructive. Vast quantities of water vapor 
and carbon dioxide are added to the atmosphere, and new supplies 
of rock material are transferred from the interior to the exterior 
of the earth. Volcanic dust (so-called ashes) is carried by the 
wind hundreds of miles and sown broadcast over the land, renew- 
ing the soil. Even lava beds, in the course of time, weather 
and crumble into rich earth and become available for the support 
of plant and animal life. By the agency of submarine volcanoes 
new lands are created amid the waste of waters. 




Fig. 55. — Results of an earthquake in Japan. 



Earthquakes. — Broken block and volcanic lands are espe- 
cially subject to earthquakes. Volcanic eruptions often cause 
earthquakes which are locally violent, but affect only a small 



THE LAND 69 

area. Great disturbances which shake literally the whole earth 
are incidents in the process of faulting, and are due to the sudden 
slipping of the blocks along a crack in the earth crust. The 
movement of the blocks may be vertical or horizontal, and does 
not exceed a few feet. The jar travels through and around the 
earth in every direction, diminishing in intensity as the distance 
from the center of disturbance increases. 

Economic Relations. — Near the center an earthquake is often 
exceedingly destructive to property and human life. Although 
the distance through which a building is moved may not exceed 
a small fraction of an inch, great speed is attained so rapidly 
that hardly any structure can withstand it. It is as if a railroad 
train should start from a state of rest and acquire a speed of 
sixty miles an hour in one second. When an earthquake occurs 
in the sea bottom or near shore, it produces enormous waves 
which may be as destructive as the quake itself. 

In Japan, where the ground seems to be never completely still, houses are 
built of very light materials. Structures of steel "and concrete upon a solid 
rock foundation are least liable to injury. Buildings of brick and wood 
standing upon alluvial or newly made ground are most dangerous. Hun- 
dreds of earthquakes occur every year, but most of them are too feeble or 
too remote from centers of population to do serious damage. The princi- 
pal areas subject to destructive earthquakes are shown on the map, Fig. 56. 

Physiographic Provinces. — Fig. 57 shows the division of the 
land according to structure, and indicates broadly the causes and 
character of relief. These divisions constitute the great physio- 
graphic provinces of the land. This map should be compared 
with the relief map, Fig. 16. 



Old Worn-down Plains. 

Broken Block and Old Folded Lands 

Young Folded Mountains. 

Old Unfolded Table-lands. 

Old Unfolded Plains. 

Young Plains (largely alluvial ). 



PHYSIOGRA 




AMERICA 



1. Laurentian Peneplain 

2. Appalachian Highland 

3. Interior Plain 

4. Rocky Mountains 

5. Intermont Plateaus 

6. Pacific Ranges 

7. Coastal Plain 



8. Caribbean Ranges 

9. Greenland Plateau 

10. Arctic Archipelago 

11. Andes Mountains 

12. Brazilian Plateau 

13. Guiana Plateau 

14. Interior Plain 



70 



PROyiNCES 

Modifications 



EURASIA 

1. Baltic Peneplain 8. Iranian Plateaus 

2. Scandinavian Highland 9. Mongol-Tibetan Plateaus 

3. Mediterranean Highlands 10. Indo-Chinese Ranges 

4. Western Basins and Table-lands 11. Chinese Plateau 

5. Baltic-Black Plain 12. Manchurian Plateau 

6. Interior Plain 13. Arabian Plateau 

7. Ural Mountains 14. Dekkan Plateau 

15. Caspian-Ob Plains 

16. East Siberian Plain 

17. Chinese Plain 

18. Indus-Ganges Plain 

19. Mesopotamian Plain 

20. Malay Archipelago 




AFRICA AND AUSTRALIA 

1. Atlas Mountains 

2. Central African Plateau 

3. Saharan Plateau 

4. Kong Plateau 

5. Cape Plateau 



6. Rift Valley 

7. Niger-Libyan Plain 

8. Australian Plateau 

9. Australian Mountains 
10. Australian Plain 



71 



CHAPTER V 

GRADATION BY RUNNING WATER 

Gradation. — If a building lot or the site of a town is rough, 
it is generally graded by cutting down the hills and filling up 
the hollows. The same process of grading is continually going 
on all over the surface of the land. The mountains and plateaus 
are being worn down and the material is carried away to lower 
levels. Valleys and basins are filled and plains are overspread 
with the waste of the highlands. The lowest and largest de- 
pressions of the earth crust are occupied by the oceans, therefore 
the process of gradation will not stop until all the land above 
sea level is carried away and deposited on the sea floor. Thus 
it happens that even lowlands are being eroded, although more 
slowly than highlands. Lowering the level of the earth crust 
by erosion is called degradation; raising its level by deposition 
is called aggradation; and the result of the two processes is 
gradation. Gradation is a very complex process carried on by 
many different agents, the work of each one of which must be 
studied separately. 

Weathering or the Disintegration of Rocks. — Wherever bed 
rock is exposed to the action of air, water, and sun, it is broken 
up and decomposed into loose mantle rock, or rock waste. The 
oxygen of the air attacks some rock minerals, especially iron, 
which rusts and crumbles into powder. The carbon dioxide of 
the air combines with lime in the rocks to form limestone, which 
is dissolved away by water. In the daytime bare rocks become 
heated by the sun and expand; at night they cool rapidly and 
contract. This change of volume repeated many times causes 
the rocks to break up and scale off. Water frozen in pores and 
cracks breaks rock, as it breaks pitchers and pipes in the house. 

72 



GRADATION BY RUNNING WATER 



73 




Fig. 58. — Frost work, Pikes Peak, Colorado. 

Mountain peaks, where freezing and thawing take place almost 
every day, are shivered to pieces and crumble into a heap of 
ruins. In arid regions sand 
olown by the wind rapidly 
wears away the hardest rocks. 
Unprotected telegraph poles 
are soon cut down by the 
sand blast. Unsupported rock 
masses are broken off and 
pulled down by gravity, and 
are reduced to smaller frag- 
ments by the fall. The growth 
of tree roots in cracks and 
the acids formed by decaying 
vegetation help on the process 
of rock destruction, while even 
burrowing animals contribute 
something to the result. The 
whole combination of proc- 
esses by which massive bed 
rocks are converted into man- 
tle rock is called weathering, and its products are clay, sand, 
gravel, pebbles, and boulders. 




Fig. 59. — Erosion by wind and sand. 
(The Sphinx, Egypt.) 



74 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



It is difficult to find an exposed surface of rock anywhere which has not 
been changed by the weather until it looks quite different from a freshly 
broken surface. Old monuments in cemeteries show the effects of exposure 
to air and rain. Buildings built at different times of the same kind of stone 
often reveal their relative ages by changes in color or surface, and in the 
course of centuries stone buildings may be badly damaged by the weather. 

Movement of Mantle Rock. — Mantle rock sometimes re- 
mains in the place where it is formed, and may accumulate to 




Fig. 60. — Talus slopes, Tongue River canon, Wyoming. Note irrigation conduit. (U. S. G. S.) 

the depth of many feet. Air and vegetable acids, carried down 
into the cracks and crevices of bed rock by ground water, extend 



GRADATION BY RUNNING WATER 



75 



the weathering process in some cases hundreds of feet below 
the surface. But mantle rock is always in a condition to be 
moved by gravity, wind, or water. At the bottom of a steep 
cliff there is usually a talus, or heap of rock fragments fallen from 
above. On mountain sides enormous masses of rock sometimes 
slide down at once and bury forests and houses in the valley. 
Such an event is called a landslide. Streams of stones moving 
slowly but continuously down a steep slope are called screes. 
Even on moderate slopes there is a slow creep of the mantle rock 




Fig. 61 . — Landslide, Switzerland. (Robin.) 

downward. Wherever mantle rock is fine and dry the wind 
blows it away, drifting sand and dust into dunes and ridges, 
spreading them over the neighboring country or carrying them 
out to sea. Glaciers transport rock fragments of all sizes, some 
as large as a house and some as fine as flour, which are left in a 
heap when the ice melts. 
The most efficient agent in transporting mantle rock is run- 



7b PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

ning water. The rain washes dirt into the streams, which buoy 
up and carry away great quantities of clay, sand, and gravel. 
The swifter the stream, the coarser the material it can carry. 
Even large boulders are rolled over one another and along the 
stream bottom (Fig. 65) . Their edges and corners are rounded off 
and the whole grist is rapidly ground finer. Where the speed of 
the current is checked a part of the load is dropped, the coarsest 
first ; and gravel or sand bars and mud banks are built up along 
the stream. If the stream flows into a lake or the sea, its current 
is stopped completely and all its load of sediment settles to the 
bottom. 

Summary. — Thus, by the various processes of weathering and 
erosion, important results are accomplished: (1) Soils, com- 
posed of various mixtures of clay, sand, gravel, and humus, are 
provided for the growth of vegetation; (2) the higher places of 
the earth crust are worn down or degraded, and the lower places 
are filled up or aggraded; (3) during this process of gradation the 
great land features are carved and molded into ever-changing 
patterns of relief. 

Valleys and Streams. — If the course of a stream is followed 
up, it will be found to be joined at intervals on either side by 
tributaries, each of which flows in a valley usually proportioned 
to the size of the stream. The main stream and its valley grow 
smaller above the mouth of each tributary until they are reduced 
to a tiny rivulet flowing in a furrow, and finally come to an end 
at a spring, pond, or swamp, or upon the smooth slope of a hill- 
side. If any tributary is followed up, it also is found to divide 
like the trunk of a tree into smaller branches and rivulets. The 
surface of the land on either side slopes toward the stream or 
one of its tributaries, and at the same time there is a continuous 
slope downstream from the head or tip of every branch. 

If the slope is ascended from the stream, at a greater or less 
distance a point is reached where the surface begins to slope away 
from that stream toward some other stream. A more or less 
definite line may be found which marks the junction of the two 



GRADATION BY RUNNING WATER 



11 




slopes and separates the water flowing into one stream from that 

flowing into the other. If this divide or water-parting is followed, 

it is found to pass around the heads of all the tributaries and 

to inclose the basin or 

area from which water 

drains into the stream 

system. 

Run-off. — Some 
part of the rain fall- 
ing upon any basin 
evaporates, a part 
sinks into the ground, 
and the remainder, Fig. 62.— Divide, vigo County, ind. 

called the run-off, flows away on the surface. Some of the 
water which sinks into the ground comes again to the surface 
and joins the run-off. The ratio of the run-off to the rainfall 
varies with the slope, structure, climate, and vegetation of the 
basin. 

At first the run-off forms a tmn and scarcely perceptible sheet; 
but it soon gathers into little rills which join one another and 
grow larger until they flow into one of the permanent branches 
of the stream system. The smallest branches flow only while it 
rains, and their grooves or gullies are dry most of the time. The 
permanent branches are supplied from ponds, swamps, glaciers, 
or springs. 

Near the sources of the stream the slopes are apt to be steep, the current 
swift, the channel narrow and deep and perhaps interrupted by rapids and 
falls. The bed is strewn with boulders, pebbles, or coarse gravel (Figs. 60, 
71, 73, 74, 77). Farther down, as the slope becomes more gentle, the bed is 
smoother, rapids are less frequent and are separated by long reaches of quiet 
water, and the channel becomes wider, shallower, and more crooked. The 
loose material is less coarse and consists chiefly of fine gravel and sand. Here 
the watercourse is likely to become double and to consist of a wide outer 
valley which the stream covers only at high water, and through which the 
narrower channel winds irregularly from side to side. Still farther down, 
the valley may become very much wider and consist of an extensive flood 



78 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 




Fig. 63. — Valley with bluffs, New York. 

plain bounded by bluffs. Here the ordinary channel follows a meandering 
course, full of zigzag bends and horseshoe curves. The slope is gentle, the 
current sluggish, and the bed obstructed by sand bars and mud banks 
(Figs. 31, 32, 63, 70, 72, 75, 76). The stream finally flows into a larger 
stream, or into a lake or the sea. 

Transportation of Sediment. — A stream of water is also a 
stream of mantle rock, by which the waste of the land is running 
away toward the sea. Some streams are clear, but they always 
contain a small quantity of invisible mineral matter dissolved 
out of the ground. A turbid or muddy stream is carrying 
mantle rock in suspension, which is kept from sinking by ripples, 
eddies, and cross currents due to irregularities in the bed. Most 
rock fragments when immersed in water are buoyed up to the 
extent of about one third of their weight, and are therefore 
more easily moved than when out of water. (Lift a stone out 
of water into the air.) In still water the finer particles of rock 
settle more slowly than the coarser, and in a current they are 
carried along more easily. (Shake up clay, sand, and gravel in 
a bottle of water and let them settle.) The size of the particles 
of rock which a stream can carry in suspension increases rapidly 
as the speed of the current increases. A current running one third 
of a mile an hour can carry clay; two thirds of a mile, fine sand; 
two miles, pebbles as large as cherries; four miles, stones as large 
as an egg. 

A swift stream can carry more sediment of any kind in suspension than 
a slow one, and a stream of any speed can carry a larger quantity of fine 



GRADATION BY RUNNING WATER 79 

sediment than of coarse; but the quantity of sediment which any stream 
can carry is limited. A stream which is carrying all the sediment it can is 
said to be loaded, or, less appropriately, overloaded. If the speed of a 
stream carrying a full load is slackened, its carrying capacity diminishes 
rapidly, and it immediately drops a part of its load, and always the coarsest 
first. If a current carrying a mixed load of clay, sand, and gravel is grad- 
ually brought to a standstill, it drops the coarse gravel first, then fine 
gravel, then coarse sand, then fine sand, and the clay last of all. Thus 
running water is the most efficient assorting agent known, and is often 




Fig. 64. — Stream bed with banks of gravel dropped by the stream, Parke County, Ind. 

used for that purpose. (Put clay, sand, and gravel in a pan of water, and 
by stirring, rinsing, and pouring wash out the clay first and then the sand.) 
If some of the sediment is much heavier than the rest, the heavier par- 
ticles are left behind, while larger and fighter particles are carried away. 
(Put fine shot and gravel in a pan of water and wash out the gravel.) This 
is the reason why a miner can " pan out " coarse gravel and have fine gold 
dust left in his pan. If rock fragments are too large for a stream to buoy 
up and carry, it may push and roll them along the bottom. 

The Speed of Streams. — A stream is swifter on a steep slope 
than on a gentle one. It is also swifter in the narrow parts of 
its channel than in the wide parts, because the same quantity 
of water must pass through both in the same time. Therefore 
any stream is swifter and more powerful at high water than at 



8o 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 





Fig. 66. — Alluvial coae 



Fig. 65. — Stream bed with boulders. 

low water. The greater the 
volume and speed of a stream, 
the greater the quantity and 
the coarser the quality of the 
sediment it can carry. 

In times of flood, streams bring 
down great quantities of coarse 
material which they are obliged to 
drop as the flood subsides. When 
a stream is low in summer, it may 
not seem to be carrying any sedi- 
ment at all, but its channel may 
be strewn with heaps of large stones 
which it brought down at the last 
spring flood. If a slow stream is 
loaded with fine sediment, any ob- 
struction, as a boulder, log, fallen 
treetop, or even a small stake, may 
check the current sufficiently to 
cause a mud or sand bar to be de- 
posited on the downstream side. 

All the sediment carried by a stream must, 

Wherever the 



Deposition. 

sooner or later, be deposited at lower levels 



GRADATION BY RUNNING WATER 



8l 



current is checked deposition is apt to occur. A stream flow- 
ing down a steep bank rapidly erodes a gully and deposits the 
material at the bottom of the bank in a conical or fan-shaped 




Fig. 67. —Alluvial fan, Switzerland. (Robin.) 



heap. Along the foot of a mountain range this process some- 
times occurs on a large scale, each mountain stream building a 
steep alluvial cone, or a Rat fan which may spread out several miles. 




Fig. 68. — Contour map of alluvial fan. (U.S.G.S.) 

Along the foot of the Wasatch Mountains, in Utah, and of the Sierra 
Nevada, in California, the alluvial fans are so large as to touch one another, 
forming a continuous piedmont alluvial plain. An alluvial fan sometimes 
affords extraordinary facilities for agriculture by irrigation. The water 
naturally spreads over the fan and can be easily guided to any part of it. 



82 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 




Fig. 69. —A part of the Mississippi delta. Numbers show depths in fathoms. (U.S.G.S J 

Whenever a stream overflows its banks it deposits sediment 
on the flooded ground and forms an alluvial plain, which in the 



GRADATION BY RUNNING WATER 



83 



lower course of a large river may become many miles in width. 
At the mouth of a river the alluvial plain may extend into a 
lake or the sea in the form of a delta, which is a flat alluvial fan 
built in the water. At the head of the delta the stream divides 
into distributaries and enters the sea by many mouths. The 
surface of a delta cannot be raised far above sea level, and is 
liable to be flooded by the river and by tides. The soil of delta 
lands is so fertile that it is often profitable to protect them by 
dikes or embankments, as has been done on a large scale at the 
mouth of the Rhine. 

Sediment deposited by water is always more or less completely assorted, 
the finer from the coarser, and deposited in nearly horizontal strata. The 
stratified rocks which form a large part of the earth crust are nearly all 
made from sediment deposited by water. 



>"" '■'.' ' .~\^ 


t"j 




Iw^" 7 


|n|^9| 




ra|fe 


IH3^^" ;. 


i 






HaggLjr 






.*>*--. 




■ 





Fig. 70. — Cut banks and bars. 



The Crookedness of Streams. — The movement of water in 
a stream is retarded by friction against the bottom and banks, 
and against the air on the upper surface. Therefore the water 



84 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



Ws&i&fc 






,/j 








u, -- 










BNhMii \;E 




5^- 


< / i 


Wte' ■'• .'^fc 


>-' j 






' V . : -:r : \_ ; ■';•"" 


• , ^ 







Fig. 71. — Gully in gravel. 



moves fastest a little below the surface and along the line of the 
deepest channel. A flowing stream cannot be straight, because 
there is sure to be more resistance on one side than on the other, 
and a small obstruction is sufficient to turn the current toward 

the opposite bank. A 
strong stream on a steep 
slope is not easily turned 
aside and is compara- 
tively straight, but the 
same stream on a gentle 
slope meanders from side 
to side and becomes very 
crooked. In a winding 
stream the current is 
swifter on the outside of 
the bend, and there it 
cuts away the bank and 
deepens its channel. On the inside of the bend the slower 
current is unable to carry its load and builds up a sloping bar 
of mud or sand. In this way the stream is constantly shifting 
its channel sidewise and widen- 
ing its valley. 

Valley Forms. — A clear 
stream running over bed rock 
may dissolve it slowly, but a 
stream carrying a moderate 
load of sand and gravel uses 
them as tools with which it 
saws or files its way down 
through the hardest rocks. A 
swift stream erodes faster at 
the bottom than at the sides, and cuts a deep, narrow valley. 
A slow stream is usually unable to sweep its bed clear of sedi- 
ment and therefore cannot cut it deeper. Its energy is expended 
in wearing away its banks, and in this way a small stream may 




Fig. 72. — Meandering stream. 




Fig- 73- — Portion of the Grand Canon of the Colorado, and the mouth of the canon of 

the Little Colorado River. Scale about i mile per inch. Contour interval 5° feet. 

(Vishnu, Arizona, Sheet, U.S.G.S.). 

85 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



in the course of time make a wide valley. Its work may be 
done so slowly that scarcely any change is noticeable in a life- 
time, but if it carries away only ten wagon loads of dirt from 

each mile of its course in a 
year, it can, in 50,000 years, 
make a valley 100 feet wide 
and 25 feet deep. 

A small but deep and narrow 
valley is called a ravine or gorge. 
In plateaus and mountains rivers 
are able to cut canons of enormous 
dimensions. The Colorado River 
flows for about 1000 miles through 
a series of canons, of which the 
Grand Canon in Arizona is prob- 
ably the most extensive cut any- 
where in the face of the earth. It 
is 217 miles long, eight to fifteen 
miles wide, and about one mile 
deep. The river is not utilizable 
for navigation or irrigation, but 
the scenery of the canon is unsur- 
passed for grandeur and beauty. 
The depth of the cut and the 
length of the main canon and its 
tributaries present an exposure of 
rock strata so clear and extensive 
that geographers and geologists have probably learned more about the 
structure of the earth crust and the process of erosion from the Colorado 
canons than from any other region in the world. 

Upper, Middle, and Lower Parts of a Valley. — The head- 
waters of a large river are generally in highlands where the 
slopes are steep. The tributaries have a rapid fall and are often 
rushing torrents. Their erosive power is very great, but their 
volume is small. The valleys they cut are deep, narrow, strewn 
with large boulders, and interrupted by falls. In the middle 
part of its course the slope is more gentle, but the volume 
of water is larger, and it is here that the greatest amount of 




Fig. 74. — Royal Gorge, Colorado.^ 

3000 feet deep. 



GRADATION BY RUNNING WATER 



87 



erosion takes place. The river carries away such quantities of 
sediment that its valley becomes both deep and wide. In the 
lower course the slope is very gentle, the current is feeble, and 




Fig- 75- — Low water, Wabash River, Terre Haute, Ind. 

the load too great to be carried. The land surface is not far 
above sea level, below which the river cannot deepen its valley. 
The current is continually obstructing itself by its deposits of 




Fig. 76. — High water, Wabash River, Terre Haute, Ind. 

sediment, which compel it to shift its channel. It cuts away 
its bank in one place and builds it up in another, developing a 
wide flood plain bounded by bluffs. 

A stream which is actively deepening its valley is young (Figs. 



88 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 




Fig. 77. — Young valley. (Forty Mile Creek, Alaska.) 



60, 73, 74, 77, 79, 83). 
A stream which has 
deepened its valley as 
far as possible, and 
has smoothed out 
rapids and falls, has 
reached base level and 
is mature (Figs. 63, 
78, 79, 95). A stream 
which is widening its 
valley and aggrading 
its flood plain has 

reached a condition of old age (Figs. 31, 32, 64, 72, 79, 94, 97, 98). 
Playf air's Law. — The relation of valleys and streams was 

stated by John Playf air in 1802: 

" Every river appears to consist of a main trunk fed from a variety of 
branches, each running in a valley proportioned to its size, and all of them 
together forming a system of valleys, communicating with one another, and 
having such a nice adjustment of their slopes that none of them join the 
principal valley either on too high or too low a level: a circumstance which 
would be infinitely improbable if each of these valleys were not the work of 
the stream which flows through it." 

Streams and Relief. — The first effect of stream erosion upon 
the land surface is to cut it up into a system of valleys with 
broad ridges or divides between. As the valleys grow deeper 
and wider, the divides grow narrower and are gradually eaten 
away until their crests are sharp; the whole surface consists of 
slopes, and traveling across it is " all uphill and down." When 
the surface has been made as rough as possible and there is 
little or no level land left, it is said to be maturely dissected, or 
simply mature (Fig. 78) . After the stage of maturity, continued 
stream work makes the divides lower and the valley bottoms 
wider. The country begins to grow smoother, and in the course 
of time is reduced to a plain of low relief, not far above sea 
level (Figs. 29, 30, 79, in), called a peneplain (almost a plain). 







Fig. 78. — Maturely dissected plateau, and graded valley, Ohio and West Virginia. 
Scale about 1 mile per inch. Contour interval 20 feet. (Athalia Sheet, U.S.G.S.) 



90 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

During the earlier stages of stream erosion the land surface ,# s 
made rougher, during the later stages it is made smoother, and 
the final result is to degrade the land and aggrade the sea 
bottom, until they are both graded nearly to sea level. 

Upon a completely graded peneplain the processes of stream erosion 
cease, because the streams have no longer a slope sufficient to enable them 
to carry sediment. But if a peneplain is uplifted by internal forces the 
revived streams will begin the process of gradation all over again. Gra- 
dation goes on most rapidly on mountains because weathering is more 
active there, and the slopes are so steep that gravity and running water 
can pull down and carry away great quantities of mantle rock. Conse- 
quently mountains do not last long, and all high mountains are compara- 
tively young. For the same reasons, plateaus are degraded more rapidly 
than plains. Heavy rainfall favors rapid degradation because water helps 
to decompose and wash away rocks, and streams are larger and more 
numerous in wet regions. Some kinds of rocks are more resistant to weath- 
ering and erosion than others, and are left projecting as the general surface 
is lowered. A covering of forest or other vegetation generally retards 
erosion. 

Economic Relations. — The value of a region for human occu- 
pation depends largely upon the stage of gradation it has reached. 
Young, low plains are smooth, gently sloping, easily accessible, 
and generally productive. The work of gradation progresses 
slowly and can never produce a surface of strong relief. All 
human occupations may be carried on with ease, and in all stages 
plains are fitted to support a large population with a minimum 
expenditure of energy. 

Young plateaus of moderate height are second in value only 
to plains. Gradation begins as soon as the surface is exposed 
above the sea, goes on during the long, slow process of upheaval, 
and usually before any great height is reached has progressed 
so far as seriously to roughen the surface. As dissection of the 
plateau approaches maturity, it is cut up into an intricate system 
of deep valleys and narrow ridges, which is as inconvenient as 
possible for carrying on any kind of human business (Figs. 43, 
78, 79). In the stages beyond maturity, as old age approaches, 
the relief of a plateau becomes smoother, and as a peneplain it 



GRADATION BY RUNNING WATER 



91 



finally reaches a. condition not essentially different from that of 
a region originally a low plain. 

Most young mountains are high and extremely rugged, like 
the Alps, and are of all regions the most difficult of utilization 
by man. In some young mountains, like the Jura (Fig. 39), 




Fig. 79. — Youth, maturity, and old age. (Blackwelder and Barrows, Elements of Geology.) 

the earth crust has been less violently disturbed, folded, and 
broken, and the region is correspondingly less forbidding. Such 
regions pass through changes somewhat like those of a plateau. 
As a rule, it is only in old age that mountain regions become so 
far worn down and smoothed off as to be fitted for occupation 
by any large number of people. The Appalachians furnish a 
notable example of an old mountain region. The general law is 
obvious that lowlands are the homes of the most highly civilized 
Peoples. 




Fig. 80. — Niagara Falls and Gorge. Scale about 1.25 miles per inch. 
Contour interval 20 feet. (Niagara Falls Sheet, U.S.G.S) 

92 



GRADATION BY RUNNING WATER 



93 



Waterfalls. — Wherever the slope of a stream bed is abrupt 
or steep, falls and rapids occur. They are usually due to an 
outcrop of resistant rock which the stream cannot wear down 
as rapidly as the softer material in other parts of its course. 
In a brook a tree root or a bed of clay on top of sand will make 
a fall. Glaciated valleys are often bordered by cliffs over which 
streams cascade. Such falls are sometimes of great height, like 
those of the Yosemite Valley in California (Figs. 84, 105), and 
many in Norway. Falls and rapids in large rivers generally 
occur where the stream crosses a bed of limestone, granite, or 
lava. The force of the falling water deepens the channel below 
the falls and undermines the cliff behind them, so that the falls 
retreat upstream, leaving a gorge below (Figs. 80, 81, 82, 86). 




Fig. 81. — Gorge of Niagara River, made by retreat of the Falls. 

The Niagara River falls over a limestone ledge into a gorge 400 feet deep 
and seven miles long, which the river has cut by the migration of the falls up- 
stream. The gorge below the Victoria Falls on the Zambezi River in Africa, 
500 feet deep and 40 miles long, has a peculiar zigzag course on account of 
cracks in the bed of lava. Rapids and falls are most numerous in moun- 
tains and plateaus, and in young streams everywhere. An old stream has 
tad time enough to wear down and smooth out the irregularities of its bed. 



94 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



Economic Relations. — Waterfalls are becoming more and 
more valuable as sources of power for running machinery. Most 

of them are not easily 
available because 
they occur in remote 
and inaccessible re- 
gions, but if the power 
cannot be brought to 
the present site of an 
industry, the industry 
may be moved to 
the place where - the 
power is. 

Of all the water powers 
in the world that of Niag- 
ara Falls is the most val- 
uable, because of the large 
and constant volume of 
water, and still more be- 
cause it is situated in the 
midst of a densely popu- 
lated district. A part of their power is now used to generate electricity 
which is transmitted over wires to run railroads and factories, and to fur- 
nish light to cities within 150 miles. There is power enough at Niagara to 
supply four or five of the largest cities in America. 

Waterfalls are among the most attractive scenic features of 
the world and have a high value apart from any use that can be 
made of their power. On account of their beauty and grandeur 
and because they are so easily accessible, Niagara Falls are visited 
by about 600,000 people every year. The use of the water for 
power seriously impairs their beauty and might entirely destroy 
it. Whether it would be better for the human race to keep the 
falls in their natural state to give pleasure to future millions, or 
to destroy them by diverting the water for power purposes, is 
an important practical question which the present generation 
is called upon to decide. 




Copyright by Doubleday, Page & Co. 

Fig. 82. — Gorge of the Zambezi. 



CHAPTER VI 

THE ECONOMIC RELATIONS OF STREAMS 

Drainage. — The first important function of streams is to 
drain the land by carrying surplus rain water to the sea. When 
a land surface is first exposed to stream action by elevation above 
the sea, or by the melting of an ice cap, the drainage is imperfect. 
Depressions are occupied by lakes, ponds, and marshes, which, 
if numerous, are sure indications of youthful drainage. 

The glaciated regions of northern North America and Europe and the 
recently elevated land of Florida are conspicuous examples. On low plains 
and gentle slopes drainage develops slowly and remains imperfect for a 
long time. The shallow lakes of the glacial drift are being filled with accu- 
mulations of mud and peat which promise to be of value in the future 
for cement and fuel. Wet, undrained land is comparatively worthless for 
human occupation. It produces at best only inferior timber or coarse 
herbage. Artificial drainage by open ditches and tile drains may convert 
such land into excellent farms and gardens. The area of marsh lands in 
the United States which might be drained is larger than the area of arid 
lands that can be irrigated. 

In a mature drainage system every part of the land is drained, 
and any drop of rain falling upon its basin may find its way 
to the sea. On plateaus and in mountainous and hilly regions, 
slopes are steep and drainage is often too rapid. The soil is 
washed away, the surface is cut up by gullies, and the lowlands 
are buried in sand and gravel. In the old countries where soil 
is precious this waste is sometimes checked by a series of dams. 
Such areas ought to be used for the growth of forests, which 
retard the run-off and prevent waste by erosion. 

Erosion. — Streams are not currents of running water only, 
but also of running rock. Through them the solid land is drain- 
ing away to the sea. Everywhere except in desert regions the 

95 



96 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



details of landscape are due to stream or glacial action. Valle)^ 
are cut in the earth crust, thus making its materials accessible, 
revealing its structure, and producing a great variety of scenery. 
Rocks and minerals originally buried far below the surface have 
been uncovered and exposed. There would be no coal mines in 




Fig. 83. — Watkins Glen, New York: A very young gorge in shale rock- 

Pennsylvania if streams had not removed from the surface of 
that region beds of rock several miles in thickness. The cuts 
made by streams into the earth crust are invaluable to the 
geologist, because he finds there exposed all kinds of rocks and 
is able to study their composition and arrangement, to deter- 
mine their origin and history, and to learn how the earth has 
been made. He finds in the rocks the fossil remains of thou- 
sands of plants and animals which no human being ever saw 




97 



98 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 




Fig. 85 



•Red Butte, Nebraska. (U.S.G.S.) 



alive, and is able to read the history of life on the earth during 

past millions of years. 

If it were not for stream erosion 
the surface of the land would be 
as monotonous and uninteresting 
as the bottom of the sea. There 
would be no ravines, gorges, canons, 
cliffs, buttes, mesas, spurs, passes, 
or peaks. Even mountain ranges 
would be tame and unimpressive. 
The most famous scenery in the 
world, the Grand Canon, the Yo- 
semite Valley, the Niagara Falls 
and Gorge, the valleys of the Hudson and the Rhine, the Scotch Highlands, 
the English and Italian lakes, the fiords of Alaska and Norway, would not 
be in existence. Few things in nature 
are more attractive to men than run- 
ning water. Without it the world 
would be a much less pleasant place 
to live in. 

Water Supply. — One of the 
prime requisites for plant or 
animal life is an adequate 
water supply. Many species 
of shellfish, fish, frogs, insects, 
waterfowl, and higher animals, 
from the muskrat to the hip- 
popotamus, find in streams a 
home and a storehouse of food. 
All the higher animals visit 
them frequently to drink. The 
hunter in pursuit of game, 
whether it be duck, deer, gi- 
raffe, lion, or elephant, lies in 
wait by the water's edge, where 
he knows thirst will bring his victim in due time. A man con- 
sumes nearly a gallon of water a day, and if it happens to con- 
tain the germs of disease it may be a fatal poison as well as a 




Fig. 86. 



■ Taghanic Falls and Gorge, 
New York. 



THE ECONOMIC RELATIONS OF STREAMS 



99 



food. Travel and settlement have been strongly influenced by 
water supply. Springs have determined the location of trails, 
camps, homesteads, and villages. 

Scattered and rural populations 
depend generally upon ground water 
obtained from wells, but in cities, 
where thousands or millions of people 
are crowded together upon a few 
square miles, wells are inadequate 
and dangerous. Large cities must 
almost always depend upon streams 
for water supply. A lake forms a 
natural reservoir of generally clear, 
pure water, and if necessary an arti- 
ficial lake can be made by means of 
a dam. 

Few cities are so fortunate as Chicago in 
having a fresh-water sea at its doors. Yet 
Chicago has had to reach out under the lake 
with a tunnel six miles long to obtain water 
free from pollution, and to spend thirty mil- 
lion dollars on a canal to carry away its 
drainage. St. Louis and New Orleans have 
the mighty flood of the Mississippi to draw 
upon. The water is muddy, but the mud is 
harmless and can be filtered out. New York 
has taken possession of the Croton River 
basin, and brings a larger supply 85 miles 
from the Catskills. Glasgow brings water 
from Loch Katrine, 42 miles, Manchester 
from Thirlmere,. 96 miles, and Liverpool 
from artificial Lake Vyrnwy, 67 miles. 
Los Angeles is constructing an aqueduct 250 
miles long, and tunneling through a moun- 
tain range, to get water from Owens River. 
London has sanitary control of the whole Thames basin, which is hardly 
adequate to supply water to seven millions of people. No city can afford 
to spare pains or expense to obtain a sufficient and safe water supply. 




Fig. 87. — Los Angeles aqueduct. 



IOO PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

Food Supply. — Nearly all streams contain fish of some kind, 
and in large rivers and lakes, such as the St. Lawrence system, 
fisheries form an important source of food supply. The rivers 
of the Pacific coast of America, from the Sacramento northward, 
once furnished in the form of salmon one of the most abundant 
food supplies in the world. The United States Fish Commis- 
sion, and similar bureaus in other countries, have been organized 
to preserve and increase the supply of fish food by distributing 
eggs and fry and by regulating seasons and methods of fishing. 

Travel and Transportation. — Streams furnish easy routes ot 
travel and transportation. In new and undeveloped countries 
they are often the only practicable routes. They are extensions 
of sea facilities into the land, and of lowlands into highlands. 
Explorers, from Hudson, Champlain, and La Salle to Livingstone 
and Stanley, have penetrated the continents by way of great 
rivers. After a country has been long occupied by civilized 
people, rivers still remain cheap and ready-made freight routes, 
without expense for construction and maintenance. 

The Amazon admits large vessels 2,000 miles into the interior of Brazil, 
and, with its many large tributaries, constitutes the only means of travel 
through an area nearly as large as the United States. The Belgian Kongo 

is being opened to trade and 
civilization by means of its 
rivers. In China one fourth 
of the human race depend 
upon their great waterways 
for circulation of people and 
goods. In Europe the Seine, 
Rhine, Elbe, Danube, and 

Fig. 88. -Railroad following .grade of Allegheny y olga are to . day great h j gh . 
River. (U.o.G.b.) _ , 

ways of commerce. North 
America has been settled largely through its great rivers, and while water 
transportation is now to a great extent superseded by railroads, the St. 
Lawrence and the Great Lakes transport as many tons of freight as the 
Mediterranean Sea. 

Rivers have been at work for ages grading their valleys, and 
when man undertakes artificial highways he avails himself of 







THE ECONOMIC RELATIONS OF STREAMS 



IOI 



their work. Canals and railways follow stream valleys wher- 
ever possible. Their construction would be everywhere more 
costly, and in rough and mountainous countries impossible, if the 
streams had not first cleared the way. Nearly every important 
city in the world is located upon a river and stands where it does 
because of the river. 

Water Power. — Wherever water runs downhill, the force of 
gravity or the weight of the water can be used to drive machinery. 




Fig. 89. — Water power on Genesee River, Rochester, N. Y. 



The most valuable water powers are found at natural cataracts 
or rapids where the fall, usually distributed over many miles, 
is concentrated in a small space. In the absence of natural 
rapids or falls, an artificial fall must be made by means of a dam. 
For this purpose swift streams with deep, narrow valleys, like 
those of New England, are most advantageous. Abundant 
water power, with few exceptions, is found in highlands and 
along the upper courses of streams. For this reason moun- 



102 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



tainous countries such as Switzerland, Italy, and Norway are 
becoming important manufacturing centers. 

Irrigation. — To have water to use whenever needed is an 
ideal condition for raising any crop, and is far better than de- 
pendence upon irregular and uncertain rainfall. Irrigation is as 




Fig. 90. — Irrigating ditches in orange grove, Arizona. 

old as civilization. It is a remarkable fact that the localities 
where civilization first appeared were deserts which, in their 
natural state, were almost uninhabitable. 

Six or seven thousand years ago men learned to make use of the over- 
flow upon flood plains and to improve and extend the natural process 
by means of reservoirs, canals, and ditches. In the valleys of the Tigris, 
Euphrates, and Nile, populous- and powerful communities depended for 
existence upon irrigation. In the present century the British in Egypt 
have constructed immense dams which retain enough water to make thou- 
sands of acres of desert productive. Similar works have been under- 
taken by the British to restore the ancient prosperity of Mesopotamia. 
Irrigation has been practiced from time immemorial in Turkestan, India, 
Spain, Italy, and Mexico. The United States government is now engaged 
in the construction of an extensive system of irrigation works which will 
result in the reclamation of millions of acres of arid land. Irrigation on a 
large scale is possible only in the lower courses of rivers where the valley 
is wide, or on plains and plateaus bordered by mountains from which the 
water may be distributed over the land. 



THE ECONOMIC RELATIONS OF STREAMS 



!°3 



The Utilization of Rivers. — A river is most usable for naviga- 
tion when it has a large and comparatively constant volume of 
water, a small or moderate load of sediment, a graded slope, a 
gentle current, and a wide, shallow valley. Such rivers occur 
in plains and low plateaus of medium or heavy rainfall. A lake 
in the course of a river adds greatly to its advantages. The 
lake is wide, its water is deep and still, and its surface is level. 
The river below the 
lake is clear and not 
subject to floods or 
low stages of water. 
Drowning of the 
lower part of a river 
valley produces con- 
ditions similar to 
those of a lake. 

In the possession of 
these characteristics the 
St. Lawrence is preemi- 
nent among the rivers of 
the world. Its valley is 
drowned to a point 900 
miles from the sea, and 
the five Great Lakes have an aggregate length of nearly 1,500 miles, leaving 
only 300 miles of the system with any perceptible current. ' In sailing from 
Buffalo to Chicago, a distance of 800 miles, a vessel ascends only nine feet, 
or to Duluth, a still greater distance, only thirty feet. 

In most streams there is some variation of volume dependent 
upon seasonal rainfall, snow melting, and evaporation. In the 
middle latitudes of Europe and eastern North America, high 
water is due to winter rains, or melting snow on frozen ground, 
and occurs in the late winter or spring. The Ohio, Seine, Rhine, 
Elbe, and Danube belong to this group. The rivers of northern 
North America and Eurasia derive their main water supply 
from melting snow and have high water in the spring. The 
floods are made much more extensive and prolonged by great 




Fig. 91. — Lake steamer. 



104 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

ice dams in their lower courses, which persist and hold the water 
back long after the upper courses are clear of ice. On account 
of such conditions these rivers are of little use. They include 
the Yukon, Mackenzie, Saskatchewan-Nelson, Dwina, Petchora, 
Ob, Yenisei, and Lena. 

In the tropical regions of South America and Africa and the 
monsoon regions of Asia high water occurs with the heavy rains 
of summer. The rivers of this class include the Orinoco, Amazon, 
Parana, Kongo, Zambezi, Nile, Ganges, Brahmaputra, Yangtse, 
Hoang, and Amur. 

Rivers in mountains and high plateaus are utilizable chiefly 
for power in their upper courses and for irrigation in their lower. 
Their main water supply is from melting snow,* and they are 
subject to great changes of volume. The most important flow 
from the interior highlands of North America and Asia, and in 
crossing arid lowlands in their way to the sea lose a large part 
of their volume by evaporation. Among these are the Missouri, 
Arkansas, Red, Colorado, Columbia, Euphrates, Tigris, Amu, 
Syr, and Indus. The rivers of southern Europe and California 
belong to this class, and being small, almost run dry in summer. 

In desert and semi-arid regions the streams are generally intermittent 
or occasional, drying up a part of every year, or flowing only at irregular 
intervals. They are useful only for irrigation. 

The Savannah River. — Some rivers are utilizable for all pur- 
poses. The Savannah River, between Georgia and South Caro- 
lina, is an example. Although the total length of its basin is 
only 250 miles, it traverses three distinct belts, — the mountain, 
the plateau, and the plain. 

Its headwaters are in the Blue Ridge, where the rainfall is 
heavy, the slopes are steep, and there are many falls and rapids. 
One tributary, the Tallulah, presents a succession of good water- 
power sites for thirty miles, ending in a fall of 400 feet in five 
miles. This region should be wholly devoted to the growing 
of hardwood forests, and the power should be used to run saw- 
mills and other machinery. 



THE ECONOMIC RELATIONS OF STREAMS 



I°5 



The second or piedmont belt is a farming region, and raises 
cotton. A group of reservoirs located at the foot of the moun- 
tains would prevent floods, store water for use during the low- 
water periods, and help in furnishing power for cotton mills 
and wood-working factories. At the 
lower edge of the piedmont plateau 
is the "fall line," where the river de- 
scends an escarpment to the coastal 
plain. The power here has made 
the city of Augusta, with twenty- 
one cotton mills. 

From Augusta to its mouth, 
about 150 miles, the Savannah is 
a navigable tidal stream flowing 
in an alluvial valley. With its flow 
properly regulated, there would be 
a good depth of water all the year, 
and the harbor of Savannah at its 
mouth would be one of the best in 
the southern states. If the possi- 
bilities of the river were fully util- 
ized, it would furnish power, cheap transportation, and a seaport 
for a rich agricultural and manufacturing community. 

The Mississippi System. — Any one looking at a map of the 
United States would be impressed with the importance and 
advantages of the Mississippi River system which drains nearly 
half the country. The extreme headwaters on the west rise 
in the Rocky Mountains, and, flowing through narrow valleys 
and canons, with numerous rapids and falls, furnish water power 
and opportunities to irrigate the dry plains below (Figs. 60, 74, 
94). The eastern tributaries from the Appalachian Mountains 
and plateau have reached a later stage of development, and their 
valleys are generally mature and well graded, but rather narrow 
(Figs. 78, 95). The northern sources are in a region of numer- 
ous lakes which act as reservoirs and help to equalize the flow 




Fig. 92. — The Savannah River. 



io6 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



at all seasons. The branches of the system penetrate nearly 
every square mile of the interior plain, and furnished to the 
canoe of the Indian, and the white explorer and trader, easy 
routes of travel. The early settlement of the "Middle West" 
was largely accomplished by means of natboats and steamers, and 
homesteads, towns, and cities were located along the streams, 
which continued to be the chief arteries of travel and trade until 
the advent of railroads about 1850. The lower Mississippi was 
closed to commerce during the Civil War (1861-65) and since 
that time its use for transportation has rapidly declined. The 
Mississippi system on the map appears to furnish thousands of 
miles of navigable waterway, but it has proved inadequate to 
the needs of to-day. The river towns which are still prosperous 
and growing owe more to the railroads than to the river. This 
condition is due chiefly to natural causes. 

Western Tributaries. — The Missouri and other western tributaries north 
of the Red River receive most of their water from the mountains, and in cross- 
ing the plains traverse a 
region of scant rainfall. 
As a result the volume 
of water decreases toward 
their mouths by evapo- 
ration, and they are over- 
loaded with sediment. 
Their channels are shal- 
low, crooked, and con- 
stantly shifting by the 
cutting away of banks 
and the formation of bars. 
In some cases the river 
becomes braided, or di- 
vided into a network of small streams which spread out over an area a mile 
wide, but are not more than a foot deep. In the dry season the water may 
disappear from the surface, and the stream become apparently a river of 
sand. The volume of the Missouri varies greatly with the seasons. The 
water from the melting snows in the mountains reaches the lower river in 
June, when the volume may be thirty times as great as at low water in 
November. At high water it floods a wide area of bottom lands and scours 



FOO.T-M ILL SLOPES 



ARABLE BOTTOM LAND 




R A B L E BOTTOM-LAND 



FOOT-HILL SLOPES 



Fig. 93.— Braided stream. (U.S.G.S.) 



THE ECONOMIC RELATIONS OF STREAMS 107 

out its channel to great depths, only to refill it as the current slackens. 
The Missouri is nominally navigable to Fort Benton, but navigation has 
been generally abandoned. Small steamers do a local business as feeders to 
the various railroads which cross the river. 




Fig. 94. —Bighorn River in the plains, Wyoming. Irrigation canal on right bank. (U.S.G.S.) 

The upper Mississippi drains a country of moderate rainfall 
and is not subject to extreme fluctuations in volume. It dis- 
charges nearly as much water as the Missouri, and is navigated 
without much difficulty as far as St. Paul. 

The Ohio. ■ — The Ohio basin receives a heavier rainfall than 
any other part of the Mississippi system, and the river discharges 
three fourths as much water as the Missouri and upper Mississippi 
combined. The large tributaries are not overloaded and contain 
no cataracts and few rapids. The valleys are generally narrow 
and bordered by high bluffs (Figs. 78, 95). The streams are sub- 
ject to excessive fluctuations of volume. The rains and melting 
snows of spring sometimes raise the level of the Ohio at Cincinnati 
seventy feet above low-water mark, and the droughts of summer 
and autumn may reduce its depth to three feet. On a river 
whose level varies so much it is impossible to maintain per- 
manent docks and landing places, the water front of towns is 
liable to be flooded or left out of reach by boats, and navigation 



io8 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



is inconvenient and dangerous. In spite of these difficulties 
considerable business is done on the Ohio, chiefly in transport- 




Fig. 95. — ■ Ohio River, near Madison, Ind. 



ing coal from Pennsylvania in barges, which are lashed together 
and pushed in front of a steamer. The United States govern- 
ment is now building a series of dams in the Ohio which will 
maintain a depth of nine feet at all seasons. 




Fig. 96. — Ohio River barges and steamer. Landing place, Evansville, Ind. 

The Lower Mississippi. — The lower Mississippi, from the 
mouth of the Ohio to the Gulf, flows through an alluvial valley 



THE ECONOMIC RELATIONS OF STREAMS 



109 




Fig. 97. — Lower Mississippi flood plain. Fig. 98. — The Mississippi, near Greenville, 

Miss. The heavy lines show changes in 
channel in 12 years. 



no 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



25 to 80 miles wide. The distance in a direct line is 600 miles, 
but by the course of the river 1,075 miles. The river is loaded 
with the mud of the Missouri and other western tributaries, and 
the fall is less than six inches per mile. Consequently the main 
channel is extremely tortuous and changeable. 

The bank on the outer side of each bend and on the up-valley side of 
each tongue of land is rapidly cut away, while bars are built on the op- 
posite sides. Thus the river continually grows more crooked. But occa- 
sionally the neck of land 
between two bends be- 
comes so narrow that at 
high water the river cuts 
through and straightens 
itself. The new cut-ojj 
becomes the main chan- 
nel, and the old bend is 
left at one side as a horse- 
shoe lake (Fig. 98) . Thus 
the deep-water channel, 
which steamers can fol- 
low, is constantly shift- 
ing, and does not remain 
in the same place from 
week to week. Landing places must be moved, and even town sites are 
washed away or left far from the river. The lower Mississippi carries the 
flood waters of the Missouri and Ohio, which sometimes combine to increase 
its volume to more than ten times its low-water volume. It rises 53 feet 
at Cairo, 36 feet at Memphis, 48 feet at Helena, 53 feet at Vicksburg, and 
15 feet at New Orleans. Below the mouth of the Red the rise is small 
because the surplus water is carried away by the Atchafalaya and other 
distributaries. In the natural state of the river the flood waters spread 
out over the valley floor, and finally drain off through the bayous, or side 
channels, to the main stream farther down. As the river overflows its 
banks the current is checked rather suddenly, and the larger and coarser 
part of its load of sediment is dropped within a mile or two of the channel. 
Thus the river builds up its own banks above the general level of the flood 
plain, forming natural levees (Fig. 99) . The floods leave a thin layer of fine 
and fertile mud over the submerged lands, which thus acquire a soil of great 
and frequently renewed fertility. But the floods are destructive to prop- 




Fig. 99. — Natural levee, Wabash River, Ind. 



THE ECONOMIC RELATIONS OF STREAMS 



III 



erty, and render the utilization of such lands for agriculture difficult and 
precarious. 

The governments of the United States and of the various states con- 
cerned have spent many millions of dollars in works designed to prevent 
floods and to improve the navigable channel. These works include the 




Fig. ioo. — A Mississippi levee, Greenville. High water above the level of the town. 

construction of reservoirs at the sources of the upper Mississippi to store 
water for use during low stages, the dredging of channels across bars, and 
the protection of banks which are liable to be cut away. But the most 
important and expensive work done consists in the building of artificial 
levees or embankments of earth, which are now completed on both sides 
of the river nearly up to the mouth of the Ohio. Confining the flood 
water to the narrow space 
between the levees causes it 
to rise higher than before, 
and it sometimes runs over 
or breaks through, but about 
three fourths of the alluvial 
valley seems to be effectu- 
ally protected from floods. 
Whether the confinement of 
flood waters will cause the 
river to scour out and deepen 
its channel, to the advantage of navigation, remains to be seen. A deep 
water way (fourteen feet) from the Great Lakes to the Gulf is greatly 
needed, but the expense of construction and maintenance would perhaps 
be too great for even so rich a country as the United States. 




Fig. ioi. — Mississippi steamer. 




112 



CHAPTER VII 



GRADATION BY ICE 

While running water is the most effective agent in modifying 
the relief of the land surface, many important features are due 
to moving ice. On high mountains and in polar regions at 
low levels, more snow falls than can be melted, and it therefore 
accumulates from year to year. A bank of permanent snow 
slowly changes by thawing, freezing, and pressure into solid ice 
which drains away down the slopes, somewhat as water does. 

Valley or Alpine Glaciers. — A valley or alpine glacier is a 
stream of ice, fed by a snow field above and following a valley 




Fig. 103. — Confluence of three glaciers, Switzerland. (Robin.) 

line down to the sea, or to warmer levels where it is melted and 
changed into a stream of water. In comparison with a river, 
an ice stream is slow, stiff, and awkward, progressing only a few 
feet a year, yet it accomplishes great results. At its very head 

"3 




Fig. 104. — A cirque in the Sierra Nevada, California. (U. S. Bureau of Fisheries.) 




Fig. 105. — Glaciated valley, Lauterbrunnen, Switzerland. 
114 



GRADATION BY ICE 



"5 




Fig. 106. 



Nunatak Glacier, Alaska, discharging bergs into a fiord. 
Ice divide in the distance. (U.S.G.S.) 



it freezes to loose rock fragments and drags them away from the 
valley walls and bottom. Thus a semicircular hollow is grad- 
ually eaten into the mountain side, which comes to resemble a 
gigantic armchair and is called a cirque (Figs. 104, 40). Several 
glaciers working on different sides may reduce the mountain 
summit to a thin, sharp, and jagged ridge. Great quantities of 
dirt and stones slide and fall from the steep sides of the valley 
upon the surface of the ice and are carried downstream. The 
ice is often a thousand feet or more in thickness, and its pres- 
sure on the valley bottom over which it slides amounts to many 
tons per square foot. The sand, gravel, and boulders frozen into 
the under surface convert the glacier into a powerful rasp which 
scratches, rubs down, and planes off the bed rock. The valley 
is deepened and widened into a rounded shape, like the letter 
U, easily distinguished from the sharp V-shaped valley of a 
river (Fig. 105). 

If the glacier reaches the sea, the ice breaks off in large chunks, or ice- 
bergs, which drift about and are finally melted. In most cases a glacier 
is brought to an end far from the sea by melting, and the whole load of 



n6 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 




loose rock which it carries 
is left in a heap called a 
terminal moraine. A gla- 
cier can carry an almost 
unlimited load of sedi- 
ment, fine or coarse. It 
carries a boulder as large 
as a house as easily and 
rapidly as a grain of 
sand. Therefore it has 
no power of assorting ma- 
terials, as running water 
has, and does not deposit 
them in layers. Glacial 
drift is recognizable as a 
mixture of mantle rock 
of different kinds and 
sizes, from clay as fine as flour to boulders weighing many tons, all mixed 
together in a heap or spread out 
in a sheet. 

A valley glacier often consists of 
a trunk stream with many tribu- 
taries like a river system. The 
main ice stream deepens its valley 
faster than the weaker tributaries 
can, so that a glaciated valley from 
which the ice has disappeared is 
characterized by numerous water- 
falls, where the streams from the 



Fig. 107. — Glacial drift, Ontario County, N. Y. Boulders 
in stream have been washed out of clay banks. 




Fig. 108. — Glacial boulder, Indiana. 



hanging " 




Fig. 109. — Peaks worn down to snow level, Alaska. 



tributary valleys cascade 
down to the floor of the 
main valley (Figs. 84, 86, 
105). In an old glaci- 
ated mountain system, 
such as that of Alaska, 
all the valleys are deeply 
filled with ice which 
streams from the divides 
and snow fields in various 
directions, so that it is 
possible X& pass easily 



GRADATION BY ICE 117 

from one side of the range to the other over ice divides (Fig. 106). The 
peaks left projecting like islands above the snow surface, and exposed to 
severe and continuous frost action, become extremely jagged and disin- 
tegrate down to snow level, which thus acts as a base level of erosion (Fig. 
109). Below the upper limit of snow the rocks are protected from frost, 
but exposed to the abrasive and smoothing action of moving ice. Thus a 
valley which has been formerly occupied by a glacier may present a strik- 
ing contrast between the smooth and polished surface of its lower slopes 
and the rough and splintered surface above (Figs. 102, 103). 

Valley glaciers and glaciated mountain valleys furnish some 
of the most impressive and fascinating scenery in the world. 
They have a peculiar charm for the physiographer, the artist, 
and the adventurous pedestrian who uses the ice surface as a 
path by which to climb the peaks or cross the range. 

Ice Caps. — An ice cap is a mass of snow and ice which accu- 
mulates upon a plateau and moves outward in all directions, as 
molasses candy spreads out on a plate. Existing ice caps vary 
in dimensions from twenty miles in diameter in Iceland to those 
of Greenland and Antarctica, where an area larger than the 
United States is completely buried. Fifty thousand or a hun- 
dred thousand years ago North America north of 40 N. Lat. 
and Europe north of 50 were nearly covered by a succession of 
ice sheets which profoundly modified the relief, drainage, and 
soil. The glaciated area may be roughly divided into two con- 
trasted parts: (1) the area of ice accumulation and erosion, cor- 
responding to the upper and middle course of a river; (2) the 
area of ice destruction and drift deposition, corresponding to 
the flood plain and delta portion of a river. 

American Ice Sheets. — In America the snow and ice accu- 
mulated on the Cordilleras of Canada and around Hudson Bay, 
and extended southward to the Columbia, Missouri, and Ohio 
rivers. Near the centers of accumulation the ice was perhaps 
two miles thick, and in moving outward it swept away the 
mantle rock, wore down the less resistant bed rock, and left a 
surface of peculiar relief, characterized by shallow basins and 
low, rounded hills, with no regularity in shape or arrangement. 



u8 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



The basins, filled with water, constitute the innumerable lakes 
which cover southern Canada with tangled chains of waterway. 
The great lakes around the border of the severely glaciated 
area, from Ontario to Great Bear, owe their form, size, and ex- 




Fig, no. — Ice sheets.of North America. (N.J.G.S.) 



istence largely to the work of the ice sheets. The general eleva- 
tion of the country was reduced some hundreds or perhaps 
thousands of feet, and the bed rock was left bare or covered 
with thin, coarse mantle rock. This of itself renders agriculture 
generally impossible. The vegetation growing on such a soil 
consists of coniferous forest, dense and of great value for timber 
in favorable localities, thin and worthless in unfavorable. On 
account of poor drainage, "muskegs," or marshes covered with 
mosses and shrubs, are numerous and extensive. The economic 
products of the country consist almost entirely of furs, of which 
it furnishes a large part of the world's supply. Lumbering is 



GRADATION BY ICE 



119 



carried on in those parts accessible to markets, and in recent 
years the great mineral wealth of the region is being utilized. 




Fig. in. — Laurentian peneplain. (U. S. Biol. Surv.) 

The Area of Glacial Drift. — The area of ice destruction and 
drift deposition lies chiefly south and west of the chain of great 
lakes in northeastern United States and southern Canada. Here 
the ice was relatively thin and its erosive power was generally 




Fig. 112. —Terminal moraine, Sheboygan County, Wis. (U.S.G.S.) 

feeble. In melting it deposited its whole load of mantle rock 
in a continuous sheet, from a few feet to several hundred feet 



GRADATION BY ICE 



121 



in thickness. The bulk of the drift is composed of boulder clay, 
a stiff clay containing many pebbles and boulders of various 




Fig. 114 Drumlin, Macedon, N. Y. (Partly plowed.) 

sizes. Generally west of Pennsylvania the old valleys were 
filled and the general level of the country slightly raised. The 
surface was converted into a smooth plain of accumulation 






Fig. 115. — Esker, FreevUle, N. Y. 

(Figs. 34, 35), varied by many ridges and belts of hills which 
mark the temporary position of the ice edge. 1 East of Ohio the 
1 Glacial drift ridges are: 

(1) Marginal moraines, formed by an accumulation of drift along the edge of 
the melting ice sheet (Figs. 45, 112). , 

(2) Karnes, irregular heaps of sediment deposited at the point where a stream of 
water escaped from the ice margin (Fig. 47). 

(3) Eskers, sharp winding ridges of sand and gravel deposited in stream chan- 
nels on or under the ice. 

(4) Drumlins, lenticular or prismatic hills of clay, formed under the ice at some 
distance back from its edge. 



122 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



glacial drift was too thin to do more than slightly modify the 
previous rough relief of the country. All the drainage systems, 

from the Columbia to the 
Ohio, were greatly changed 
by valley filling, damming, 
and ponding, displacement 
of channels, and transfer- 
ence of tributaries from 
one system to another. 

Economic Relations. — 
Of more importance than 
these changes is the fact 
that the glacial drift, 
brought from the north 
and east and liberally 




Fig. 116. — Relation of the drift sheet to agriculture. 



spread out over the country to the south and west, constitutes 
a rich, deep, and enduring soil, which makes the northern states 











^s Prague* ~ J - J Z-'->* „..\*>*j?t/ 



Prague* 



Kiefr^' 






C^ 



Fig. 117. — The continental glacier of Europe. (James Geikie.) 



GRADATION BY ICE 1 23 

and southern Canada east of the Rocky Mountains the greatest 
food-producing region of the world, and one of the most densely 
populated parts of North America. This region also owes to 
the ice sheets the most important inland waterway in the 
world, the Laurentian Great Lakes. The states heavily coated 
with glacial drift have a population of about thirty millions, or 
forty-five to the square mile. The states south of the glacial 
boundary have a population of about twenty-seven millions, or 
thirty- two to the square mile. 

European Ice Sheets. — In Europe the main region of ice accumulation 
was in Scandinavia and Finland, and the region of ice destruction and drift 
deposit in central Russia and north Germany. The same contrasts between 
the two in relief, drainage, and soil are found as in North America. Scandi- 
navia and Finland form a country of lakes and forests with a very small 
area of arable land, while Germany and central Russia are rich agricultural 
states. The European glacial drift is not generally so heavy or so pro- 
ductive as the American, and lying in higher latitudes has not influenced 
products and population to any such extent. 



CHAPTER VIII 



STANDING WATER 



Lakes, Ponds, and Marshes. — Lakes, ponds, and marshes are 
bodies of standing water which occupy depressions in the land 
surface. Lake basins are due to a variety of causes. The 
largest basins have been produced by the warping or breaking 
of the earth crust by internal forces. In some cases these basins 
are so large that the excess of rainfall over evaporation is in- 
sufficient to fill them, and the lake has 
no outlet. Salts brought by streams in 
solution accumulate, and the water be- 
comes a brine. Of such lakes the Caspian 
Sea is the largest and the Dead Sea the 
lowest, 1,300 feet below sea level. The 
Great Basin in western United States 
contains many lakes, of which Great 
Salt Lake in Utah is the largest. They 
are all subject to fluctuations of level 
and area, according to the seasons, or 
the periodic variations of rainfall. Many 
of the smaller ones are temporary, con- 
taining water for a few days or months, 
or lasting for a year or two before they 
dry up. Most of the lakes of central 
Africa lie in the course of the great rift 
valley (p. 64). Some of them have 
no outlet, but the great lakes Nyassa, 
Tanganyika, and Victoria are sources 
of the Zambezi, Kongo, and Nile. The great lakes of North 
America lie along the southwestern border of the Laurentian 
peneplain (p. 45), from New York nearly to the Arctic Ocean. 

!24 




Fig. 118. — East African lakes 
and rift valley. 



STANDING WATER 



125 



Their basins are due primarily to warping and stream erosion, 
but have been considerably modified by glacial action. On 
account of their size and location, the Laurentian lakes are of 
special importance. Lakes Superior, Michigan, Huron, Erie, 
and Ontario form the largest connected body of fresh water on 
the globe. Their form and relative positions suggest that their 
basins are parts of an old river valley which has been divided 
by a series of dams. Their great depth, extending in all except 
Lake Erie below sea level, may be due to glacial erosion. 

During the retreat of the North American ice sheet and subsequently the 
Laurentian lakes were subjected to many changes of form, area, and outlet. 
Their waters at different periods overflowed through the upper Mississippi, 
the Illinois, the Wabash, the Ottawa, and the Mohawk (Fig. 113). Their 
former outlets at Chicago, Fort Wayne, Ind., Rome, N. Y., and Nipis- 
sing, Canada, furnish easy routes for canals and railroads. Lake Winnipeg is 
a shrunken remnant of Lake Agassiz, which, held in by an ice dam on 
the north, once covered 110,000 square miles in Canada, Minnesota, and 
North Dakota, and emptied through the Minnesota River. The sediment 
deposited upon its bottom now forms the soil of the famous wheat fields of 
the Red River region. 

Glacial Lakes. — Lakes are nowhere else so numerous as in the 
regions formerly covered by the North American and European 
ice sheets, as large- 
scale maps of Canada, 
northeastern United 
States, Sweden, and 
Finland will show. 
Glacial lake basins 
are hollows in bed 
rock eroded by mov- 
ing ice, or hollows 
made by irregular 
deposition of drift. 

-..- , Fig. 119. — Glacial lake, Derwentwater, England. 

Many are partly or 

wholly due to drift dams in the course of a stream. Some are 

kettleholes left by the melting of detached blocks of ice (Fig. 48). 




i2b 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



The courses of terminal moraines are generally marked by 
thousands of small lakes, as may be seen in Indiana, Michigan, 
Wisconsin, Minnesota, and northern Russia and Germany. 

Alpine Lakes. — Long, narrow, and very deep lake basins which occur 
in mountain regions, and are hence called alpine lakes, are characteristic 





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Fig. 120. — Glacial lake, Lima, N. Y. 
Esker in left margin. 



Fig. 121. — Alpine lake, Lugano. 



results of ice work. The Italian, Swiss, and Scotch lakes and Lake Chelan 
in Washington belong to this class and are unrivaled for scientific interest 
and for grand and picturesque scenery. The Finger Lakes of New York, 
on the northern slope of the Appalachian plateau, are of similar but less 
extreme character, and are probably due to similar causes. 




Fig. 122. — Finger lake: Hemlock Lake, N. Y. 
Valley is 13 miles long, half a mile wide and 1,000 feet deep. 



STANDING WATER 



127 



Volcanic Lakes. — Lakes are in some cases due to the damming of a 
stream valley by a flow of lava from a volcano. Old volcanic craters some- 
times fill with water, forming 
lakes of which Crater Lake, 
in southern Oregon, is a 
famous example. It is five 
miles in diameter and bounded 
by precipitous cliffs from 500 
to 2,200 feet high. The water 
is 2,000 feet deep. 

Life History of Lakes. 

— In arid regions, where 

the rainfall is insufficient Fig. 123.- 

to equal the water lost 

by evaporation, the lakes have no outlet and are salt. They 

often dry up, leaving beds of salt, soda, borax, and other valu- 




- Model of the basin of Crater Lake, Oregon. 
(U.S.G.S.) 






,-s. «-".-' '-■■■'[' 









Copyright by Doubleday, Page & Co. 

Fig. 124. — Lake filling with vegetation. 



(Fletcher's Soils.) 



able minerals. In regions of abundant rainfall lakes overflow at 
the lowest point of the basin rim. As the outlet stream cuts its 
channel deeper, the water is drained away and the lake level is 



128 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

lowered. This process is often hastened by cutting an artificial 
ditch which may drain the lake completely, leaving rich agri- 
cultural land. At the same time inlet streams are filling up the 
basin with sediment and will in time convert it into a lacustrine 
plain. Therefore lakes are among the most short-lived of natu- 
ral features and are always relatively young. 

In the case of small, shallow lakes, their destruction is hastened by the 
growth of vegetation. Aquatic plants, which absorb the greater bulk of 
their food from the air, grow and decay year after year, until the basin is 
filled with vegetable matter and the lake is converted into a marsh, peat 
bog, or wet meadow. Some lake basins fill with marl, which is valuable as 
a fertilizer and for making cement. 

Economic Relations. — Lakes act as reservoirs which regulate 
the flow of outlet streams and prevent both floods and extreme 
stages of low water. They are also settling basins for sedi- 
ment, so that a stream flowing out of a lake is usually clear. 
The Niagara and St. Lawrence rivers are striking examples of 
streams which are clear and subject to slight changes of volume. 
Large lakes furnish the best of inland waterways (p. ioo). The 
smaller ones are sources of food supply and add greatly to the 
variety and beauty of landscape. Lakes are everywhere favorite 
summer resorts, which attract thousands of people who find 
pleasure and recreation in camping, boating, fishing, and bath- 
ing. The " Chautauqua," or summer assembly for religious, 
educational, social, and sanitary purposes, takes its name from 
Lake Chautauqua in New York. 

Gradation by Standing Water. — Seas and lakes are bodies of 
standing water but not of still water. Their waters have no 
general and continuous movement in one direction, as a stream 
has, but under the influence of the wind and the moon are 
agitated by waves, currents, and tides. These movements 
accomplish their most important work along the margin where 
land and water meet, and produce a characteristic series of 
coast forms. These may be found in miniature along the shore 
of almost any small lake or pond. 



STANDING WATER 



129 



Beaches and Bars. — Where the coast land is low and the 
coast waters are shallow the waves build up a ridge of sand or 
gravel which is as high as the 
highest storm waves can lift 
the material. Behind this 
beach there is generally a strip 
of shallow water called a 
lagoon. A barrier beach is a 
long, continuous ridge some 
distance off shore (Fig. 28). 
Where the shore line is in- 
dented by a bay the beach 
is often extended across its 
mouth, forming a bay bar. 
A bar built out from shore into deeper water is called a spit, 
and if bent back at the end, a hook. Barrier beaches and bars, 




Fig. 125. — Beaches and lagoons, Cayuga Lake. 



Cape Cod 




Fig. 126. — The end of Cape Cod, Massachusetts. Two hooked spits. 

as the names imply, render a coast difficult of access from the 
water and form serious obstructions to commerce. The lagoons, 
inlets, and bay mouths are usually too shallow to admit vessels 



130 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

of considerable size. Where the tides are high and strong enough 
to keep the inlets scoured out, good harbors are found. On a 
low, sandy coast wind and waves work together and dunes are 
combined with beaches. 

The Gulf and Atlantic coasts of the United States south of Cape Cod 
present perhaps the longest stretch of barrier beach coast in the world. 
On the coast of Texas the beach extends 100 miles without a break. Gal- 
veston and other bays are rendered inaccessible except by artificial channels. 
The keys and reefs of Florida are peculiar in being partly the work of coral 
animals. Along the coast of Georgia and South Carolina the tides are strong 
enough to break up the beach into the so-called " sea islands," and the 
numerous deep inlets lead to good harbors. From Charleston to New York 
the coast is bordered by a nearly continuous beach, which sweeps in long, 
gentle curves from point to point. Behind it is a belt of lagoons and tidal 
marshes, expanding in North Carolina into shallow sounds. This coast 
belt is interrupted by the drowned valleys of the Chesapeake, Delaware, and 
Hudson, which let deep tide water and the largest vessels far into the interior. 
The beaches of New Jersey and Long Island are popular summer resorts. 
Railroads have been built to and along them, and towns and cities have 
sprung up, with hotels and places of entertainment for visitors, who come by 
the hundred thousand to enjoy the sea breezes and the bathing (Fig. 28). 




Fig. 127. —Sea cliff, Lake Erie. (N.Y.G.S.) 



Sea Cliffs. — Where the coast land is high and the coast 
waters are deep, the waves pound against the shore with tre- 



STANDING WATER 



131 



mendous force and undercut it into a vertical cliff. The frag- 
ments are rolled over, ground up, and carried away by the under- 
tow, or backrush of water along the bottom. The result of this 
is a platform or terrace a little below sea level, partly cut into 
solid rock, partly built of mantle rock, and bordered by a con- 
stantly retreating cliff. The character of a cliff coast varies 
with the kind of rock. If the rock is of uniform hardness and 
without joints or seams, the cliff is smooth and unbroken, like 
the chalk cliffs of England and France and the clay cliffs of 
Lake Michigan (Fig. 35). Such a coast may be entirely without 
indentations or har- 
bors. If the rock is 
complex in material 
and structure, the 
waves soon eat away 
the weak places and 
leave the more resist- - 
ant masses standing 
out as promontories 
and islands (Fig. 43). 
Small isolated masses 
of rock along the 
shore are called sker- 
ries in Norway and 
stacks in Scotland. Such a coast may be extremely jagged and 
dangerous to shipping, while at the same time it offers numer- 
ous coves where small boats may find shelter and concealment. 
Economic Relations. — On the whole, the general result of 
the work of standing water is to cut the bordering lands down 
to its own level and to surround itself with barriers which make 
access to the land more difficult. If it were not for the power 
of running water and ice to break through the barriers, ocean 
and lake commerce would be much more restricted than it is. 




Fig. 128. — Chalk cliffs, France. Arch and stack. 



CHAPTER IX 



GRADATION BY GROUND WATER AND WIND 

The Ground Sea. — A large part of the rainfall sinks into the 
ground and penetrates the earth crust to great but unknown 
depths. The ground water may be thought of as forming a sea 
many miles in depth and extending through the rock sphere 
s beneath the land surface from 

ocean to ocean. Thus the 
water sphere is really contin- 
uous around the globe. The 
upper surface of the ground 
sea, called the water table, is 
not level, but is roughly par- 
allel with the surface of the 
land. In lakes, marshes, and 
streams the water table stands 
IJIJIII I :-| ' Iff at the surface of the ground. 

In regions of small rainfall it 
may lie a thousand feet or 
more below the surface. The 
level of the water table is not 
constant at the same locality, 
rising during a wet season and 
sinking during a dry season. 
The water of the ground sea 
is seldom at rest. In com- 
pact rocks the movement is very slow, in porous rocks more 
rapid, and in rocks traversed by open joints and cracks there 
is a circulation in streams comparable to that on the land 
surface. 

132 




Fig. 129. — Section of fissured rock and well. 
(U.S.G.S.) 



GRADATION BY GROUND WATER 



133 




Fig. 130. — Hot spring deposits, Algeria. (Robin.) 



Work of Ground Water. — Most of the minerals of the earth 
crust are more or less soluble, and as the ground water penetrates 
more deeply it be- 
comes more highly 
charged with them. 
Its temperature also 
increases with the 
depth, and the lower 
parts of the ground 
sea are probably com- 
posed of hot water 
saltier than the ocean. 
In many places the deep ground water rises to the surface, 
forming mineral springs. These waters contain gases, sulphur, 

iron, and various salts 
in solution, which ren- 
der them of value in 
the treatment of 
disease. 

Hot Springs, Ark., and 
Saratoga Springs, N. Y., 
are famous health resorts, 
and there are hundreds 
of similar character in all 
parts of the world. In 
old volcanic regions the 
earth crust is hot near 
the surface, and steam 
generated in subterra- 
nean conduits throws out 
columns of hot water, 
forming geysers, or spout- 
ing springs. The geysers 
of the Yellowstone Park 
are unsurpassed in num- 
ber, variety, and size. As 

Fig. 131. — Old Faithful geyser, Yellowstone Park. not ground water rises 




134 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 




Fig. 132. — Mouth of cave, Indiana. 



toward the surface the pressure upon it diminishes, it cools and deposits 
the minerals held in solution, eventually filling the passage. In this way 
ores of gold, silver, and other metals are concentrated and placed within 
reach of the miner. 

Limestone is a very soluble rock, and in some limestone regions 
the earth crust is honeycombed with underground drainage 

channels, leaving few- 
streams on the sur- 
face. Some of the 
channels have been 
enlarged by solution 
and the falling in of 
the roof to a diame- 
ter of hundreds of 
feet and a length of 
many miles. Most 
of the great caves of 
the world are in lime- 
stone rock, among them Mammoth Cave in Kentucky, and 
Wyandotte Cave in Indiana. 

Economic Relations. — Ground water is everywhere a common 
source of water supply for domestic use. The outflow of natural 
springs is sometimes large and of good quality, but the main 
dependence is upon wells. If a hole is sunk into the ground to 
a point below the water table, it will fill up to that level with 
water. In shallow wells the largest supply is obtained from 
strata of sand and gravel. Such wells, especially in towns, are 
unsafe for domestic use, on account of pollution by drainage 
from cesspools, sewers, barnyards, and other sources of filth. 
The clearest and most agreeable well water may be the most 
dangerous. Deep wells are less liable to contamination. 

In some cases water flows from a well without pumping, or even spouts 
into the air like a fountain. Very deep flowing wells are called artesian. 
The water of a flowing well comes from a porous stratum which outcrops 
on the surface somewhere at a higher level than the mouth of the well. 
The outcrop and source of supply may be hundreds of miles from the well. 



GRADATION BY GROUND WATER AND WIND 



135 



Over a large area of the plains east of the Rocky Mountains artesian wells 
are common, some of which furnish water enough to irrigate a hundred - 
acre farm. The water comes from thick strata of porous sandstone which 



& > 



<&& 







Fig. 133. — Cross section from Rocky Mountains across Nebraska. Dakota sandstone under 
Pierre clay carries water from Rocky Mountains and supplies artesian wells on the plains. Note 
nearly horizontal strata of plains turned up against granite core of the mountains (U.S.G.S.) 

underlie the plains at considerable depths. The sandstone outcrops along 
the foothills of the mountains, where it absorbs the rainfall and transmits 
the water eastward. Wherever a well penetrates the overlying strata and 
reaches the sandstone, water rises to the surface. 

Ground water plays an im- 
portant part in the work of 
gradation by extending the 
processes of weathering and 
rock decay to great depths, 
and by promoting chemical 
changes and transporting ma- 
terial in the earth crust. 

Work of Wind. — Wherever 
fine, dry mantle rock is ex- 
posed without a cover of veg- 
etation the wind is able to 
transport it in almost unlim- 
ited quantities. As in the 
case of running water, both 
the quantity and the coarse- 
ness of sediment which run- 
ning air is able to carry 
increase in a high ratio to the velocity, but air is so much less 
dense than water that its sediment is generally limited to dust 
and sand. Only tornadoes are capable of lifting pebbles and 




Fig- 134- 



-Artesian well, North Dakota. 

(U.S.G.S.) 



136 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

boulders. The wind is therefore a delicate assorting agent, and 
its deposits may usually be recognized by the fact that they 
have been thoroughly winnowed. Unlike running water, air 
moves in broad sheets and carries material as freely up a slope 
as down. There is a strongly marked rhythm in its motion, 
and its effects are a combination of those of currents and waves. 

One fourth of the land surface of the globe has less than ten 
inches of annual rainfall, and in such areas outside the polar 
regions wind action is generally more important than other 
processes. Rocks, subjected -to great daily changes of tem- 
perature, crumble rapidly. The lighter mineral particles, like 
mica, are carried away by the wind, and quartz grains are left 
as sand. The sand itself is blown about and acts as a power- 
ful erosive agent, undercutting cliffs and enlarging valleys. In 
general, mantle rock accumulates, and hollows at all elevations 
are filled. Some of it is transported entirely outside the desert 
region. A wind-worn surface is much less varied than a water- 
worn surface. While running water cannot erode below the 
level of the sea or of the lake into which it flows, there is no 
definite downward limit to wind erosion. Its tendency is to 
produce a stony peneplain with projecting knobs of hard rock 
and belts of drifting sand dunes (Fig. 37). When the surface is 
reduced below sea level, the §ea is liable to overflow it and stop 
the process. The margin of the desert is indefinite and fluctu- 
ating. Its sands often encroach upon neighboring cultivated 
areas unless stopped by human agency. 

Dunes. — A tornado in the desert may raise a sand column 
or spout many hundred feet and sustain it as long as the whirl 
of air continues, finally dropping it over the surrounding country, 
but the ordinary winds seldom lift sand more than a few feet. 
A slight lull causes most of it to be dropped, and it accumu- 
lates in the lee of any obstruction, as snow is drifted behind a 
fence. The pile of sand itself forms an obstruction beyond which 
more sand accumulates, and the drift or dune grows to be a hill 
with a long, gentle slope on the windward side and a steep slope 



GRADATION BY WIND 



137 



on the leeward side. The wind blows the sand up the long 
slope and drops it in the eddy beyond. Thus the pile becomes a 




Fig. 135. —Dunes, Algeria. (Robin.) 

"marching dune " which slowly advances, burying forests, build- 
ings, or whatever lies in its way. In the course of years the dune 
may move on far enough to uncover what it previously buried. 

Coast Dunes. — The margins of seas, lakes, and retreating ice sheets 
are generally bare of vegetation, and present conditions favorable for wind 
action. Low windward 
coasts are often bordered 
by belts of drifting dunes, 
as in Holland, Germany, 
France, the Atlantic coast 
of the United States, and 
the east and south shores 
of Lake Michigan. The 
dunes form a barrier 
which protects the land 
from storm waves and 
high tides, but also makes 
commerce difficult (Fig. 
28). In France the prog- „. , _, t . __ „ _ ,. 

r Fig. 136. — Dunes near coast of North Carolina. 

ress of the dunes inland 

has been stayed by the planting of pine trees. Moving sand is very un- 
favorable for the growth of vegetation, and forms the ground of nearly 




138 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

absolute desert. Sand dunes are among the most destructive agents in 
nature, and can be controlled only where some kind of vegetation can be 
made to grow upon them and hold them down. 

Dust. — Very fine dust ejected from volcanoes to a height of 
many miles has remained in the air for months, and even years, 
before settling, and has been carried around the world. The 
snow fields in the interior of Greenland, far from any exposed 
ground, are covered with fine dust, which may settle upon it 
from extraterrestrial space. Dust from the Sahara is some- 
times carried by the wind to northern Germany. 



CHAPTER X 



SOILS 



The loose rock material in which plants take root and find 
food is called soil. Practically the whole vegetative covering 
of the land, and consequently all animal and human as well as 
plant life, depend upon the soil for existence. Soils are por- 
tions of mantle rock and have been formed by the physical and 
chemical disintegration of bed rock by the agents and processes 
of weathering (p. 72). They may be thought of as "rock 
meal," or "rock flour." 

Sedentary Soils. — Soils are at first sedentary or residual, 
that is, formed by the decay of the bed rock which lies under 
them, and vary according 
to the kind of rock from 
which they are formed. 
Sedentary soils are usu- 
ally thin, but may accu- 
mulate to the depth of 
some hundreds of feet. 
They contain undecom- 
posed fragments of bed 
rock, which increase in 
number and size down- 
ward. 

Igneous rocks differ so widely 
in composition and texture 
that they weather into a great variety of soils, from very poor to very rich. 
Granite and gneiss often crumble at first into a barren gravel like that 
of the English moors. Chemical changes finally reduce the quartz to 
sand, and the feldspar and mica to clay, the latter being decomposed very 
slowly. The fertility of granitic soils is roughly proportional to the amount 

i39 




Fig. 137. — Residual gravel, Texas. 



140 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 




Fig. 138. — Residual clay on shale, Indiana. 



of feldspar present, quartz 
and mica being distinctly un- 
favorable. Lava soils vary- 
in their rate of weathering 
and fertility with their chem- 
ical composition. 

Limestone soils are famous 
for fertility, as in the blue- 
grass region of Kentucky and 
the prairies of Texas. The 
lime is dissolved and washed 
away, and the soil consists 
largely of the residue of insol- 
uble impurities. Sandstones 
weather into sandy soils which 
are generally poor, but may 
be productive from the pres- 
ence in the rock of other ingredients acting as a cement. Shale weathers 
into clay, which, if not too fine and compact, makes a good soil. Conglom- 
erate weathers into gravel, which 
is apt to be very barren. 

Colluvial Soils. — On mod- 
erate or steep slopes the 
native soil creeps slowly 
downward by the action of 
gravity, frost, and rain wash," 
and in arid regions sometimes 
accumulates in valleys be- 
tween the mountains to a 
depth of several thousand 
feet. Such slowly moving 
soil masses are called colluvial. 

Transported Soils. — The 
surface of plains, valleys, and 
lowlands is generally covered Fig . I39 _ Colluvial soil near Crawf ordsvilIei Ind . 

with Soil which has been The surface material creeps faster than that at a 

, i ., 1 r i»i slight depth, tipping the trees. (.Forestry and 

brought down from higher irrigation.) 









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142 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



levels by water, ice, or wind. Transported soils are generally 
rich because they are derived from many kinds of rocks and 




Copyright by Doubleday, Page & Co. 
Fig. 141. — Eolian soil, "Palouse Country" of Oregon and Washington. 



(Fletcher's Soils.) 



contain a mixture of minerals which is likely to include all kinds 
of plant food. 

Alluvial soils are deposited by streams on flood plains, " bot- 
tom lands," and deltas, and are well known as exceedingly pro- 
ductive. Their productiveness is due to the variety of elements 
of which they are composed, to the fineness of division, and 
to their frequent renewal by deposits from flood waters. Great 
flood plains and deltas, such as those of the Nile, Hoang, 
Ganges, Rhine, and Po, have produced great crops for thou- 
sands of years and will continue to do so in future. The allu- 
vial valley of the Mississippi and its tributaries is of the same 
character, but is not yet fully utilized (Fig. 97). 

Glacial soils are the deposits from melting ice sheets (p. 122) 
and are more variable than alluvial soils, but generally not far 
behind them in productiveness. Glacial or boulder clay con- 
tains a great variety of minerals, finely ground and intimately 



SOILS 143 

mixed, and when it includes enough of sand and gravel to make 
it pervious and workable it is extremely rich and enduring. 
The glacial drift of the United States is one of the most valuable 
food-producing areas in the world (Figs. 113, 116, 117). 

Eolian soils are deposited by the wind and are fine and sandy. 
Since they occur mostly in arid regions, where plant food is not 
washed out by rains, they retain the elements of fertility much 
better than the sands of humid regions. On desert sands, when 
wetted by slight rainfall, vegetation springs up at once, and if 
kept moist by irrigation becomes remarkably luxuriant. 

Physical Composition of Soils. — Physically soils consist of 
clay, silt, sand, gravel, and humus. 

Clay is an extremely fine, soft powder produced by the chemical 
decomposition of various minerals, of which feldspar is the most 
important. It consists of thin, rounded scales from 2~5~i^~o^ to 
5"oV"o °f an i ncn i n diameter. When wet, clay swells up into 
a sticky, plastic substance which shrinks in drying to a tough, 
coherent mass. It is very retentive of water, gases, and minerals 
in solution and presents such a large surface for the plant rootlets 
to work upon that clay soils are "strong." At the same time 
clay acts as a cement which holds other ingredients together 
and renders soil difficult to till. 

Silt and sand are rock powders produced by the mechanical 
pulverization of various minerals, of which quartz is by far 
the most abundant. Common sand consists almost entirely of 
quartz crystals more or less rounded. If the crystals are un- 
worn and angular, the sand is " sharp." The diameter of silt 
grains is from 5 ^ - to -^-q of an inch, that of sand grains from 
-g-g-g- to 2V of an inch, but even the finest silt can be recognized 
by its harsh, gritty feel between the fingers or teeth. Pure silt 
or sand is incoherent and easily worked, but does not retain 
moisture well, and is less fertile than clay. 

Gravel is composed of generally hard, rounded grains or pebbles 
from ■£% of an inch up to 2 or 3 inches in diameter, and is looser 
and more permeable than sand. 



144 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

Humus is a loose, black mold produced by the partial decay 
of vegetable and animal matter, and is an essential ingredient 
of all good soils. 

Types of Soils. — The common types of agricultural soils are 
classified as follows: 



Sandy soils contain 


80 % sand, 


10 % clay. 


Sandy loams 


60-70 % " 


10-25% " 


Loam soils 


40-60% " 


15-30% " 


Clay loams " 


io-35% " 


30-50% " 


Clay soils 


10% " 


60-90 % " 



Gravelly and stony loams contain gravel and pebbles and are 
common in regions covered with glacial drift. 

Peat and muck soils are formed by the decay of vegetation 
in shallow lakes, ponds, and swamps. Some clay and silt are 
blown in by the wind and carried in by streams. They contain 
from 30 to nearly 100 per cent of humus. If the vegetable 
matter is sufficiently decayed and is mixed with considerable 
mineral matter, good drainage renders such soils productive. 

Loess soils are peculiar deposits consisting of a mixture of silt and clay 
laid down partly by wind and partly by water, and are generally very produc- 
tive. They cover extensive areas along the borders of the glacial drift in the 
United States and Europe. The loess of China is an eolian deposit blown 
from the central plateaus and is in some places 1,000 feet thick (Fig. 142). 

Adobe soils are peculiar to semi-arid regions and common in south- 
western United States. They are very sticky when wet, and hard when 
dry, but are unusually rich in plant food. 

Alkali soils are common in arid regions. They contain large quantities 
of common salt, carbonate and sulphate of soda, and other compounds 
which are brought to the surface in solution and left by evaporation of the 
water as a whitish or black crust. Few plants will grow in such soils, but 
they can be improved by irrigation and drainage, which wash out the salts. 

Tropical Soils. — The high temperature of tropical regions 
favors rapid decomposition of soil ingredients and hastens all 
chemical changes. The luxuriance of tropical vegetation is not 
wholly due to the heat and moisture of the air, but also to the 
fertility of the soil, which is therefore in part responsible for 



SOILS 



H5 




Fig. 142. — Loess deposits^ eroded, China. (Carnegie Institution, Research in China.) 

the easy-going and indolent ways of tropical people. Tropical 
soils are exceptionally rich in humus, but plant food is rapidly 
leached out by the heavy rains. They are often of a deep-red 
color due to the diffusion of iron oxide. The red clay soils 
produced by the weathering of volcanic rocks are called laterite 
(brick earth). The name is often applied to any red soil. 

Chemical Constituents of Good Soil. — For plant growth at 
least seven chemical elements must be present in the soil in 
soluble form, — nitrogen, potash, phosphorus, lime, iron, mag- 
nesium, and sulphur. The last three are usually present in such 



146 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

abundance as to require no attention, but the first four are sure 
to be exhausted by continuous cropping and must be supplied 
artificially. Therefore, nitrogen, potash, phosphorus, and lime 
are the essential ingredients of all fertilizers. The total quantity 
needed is relatively small because plants obtain about 90 per 
cent of their substance from the carbon and oxygen of the air. 

Soils contain air and other gases which are necessary to plant life. The 
roots of most plants need air to breathe, and for farm crops the soil should 
be well ventilated by tillage and underdraining. The presence of air 
hastens the chemical processes which render plant food available, and thus 
increases fertility. 

Plants as Soil Makers. — Plants perform a very important 
work in soil-making. Two years after an eruption of Krakatao, 
a volcano in Sunda Strait, which destroyed all vegetation, the 
surface of the lava was found to be slimy with microscopic 
plant life, active in breaking down silicates into clay, combining 
elements, and preparing soil for higher plants. Most soils 
swarm with bacteria, fungi, molds, and algae which literally eat 
the rocks, and by living upon mineral matter produce humus. 
They flourish best in warm, moist, well- ventilated soils, where 
they hasten the decay of vegetable matter. Some are injurious, 
but most of them are harmless and many are beneficial. It has 
been said that the soil is not primarily a medium on which to 
grow herbs and trees, but a domain created by the activities 
of low forms of life for their own benefit, and that the higher 
plants exist by virtue of these, just as animals five by virtue of 
the herbage. 

Temperature of the Soil. — The temperature of the soil is as 
important for plant growth as that of the air above it. Few 
seeds will germinate if the soil temperature is below 45 degrees, 
and 65 to 100 degrees is most favorable. Gravelly and sandy 
soils are warmer than clay. Wet soils are cold because much 
of the heat received from the sun is used up in evaporating 
water; consequently soils are warmed by drainage. Lands 
which slope toward the sun are warmer than those sloping away 



SOILS 147 

from it, and dark-colored soils absorb more heat than light-colored. 
The temperature of the soil is raised by the fermentation and 
decay of vegetable and animal matter. 

Soil Water. — All fertile soils contain large quantities of water. 
The free or ground water nils the spaces between the particles 
up to the level of the water table (p. 132). The depth of the 
water table may generally be determined by the height at which 
water stands in surface wells. If the water table stands too 
near the surface, the plant roots may be drowned and the soil 
is of little. value until it is drained. 

Above the water table the surface of each soil grain is covered 
by a thin film of water which sticks to it and supplies the plant 
roots with food. The driest road dust contains some film 
water, and a good soil may hold more than half its weight. Film 
water is mostly derived from the free water below, but a little 
may be absorbed from the air. Film water is constantly rising 
from the water table and evaporating from the surface of the 
ground. Thus plants are kept alive through a dry season. 

The water contains salts in solution which are left by evaporation, 
forming a surface crust. It is often important to conserve the film water 
by checking evaporation. This may be done by tillage, which pulverizes 
the crust, or by covering the surface with a mulch of vegetable matter or 
even of fine dust. The finer the soil the more surface the particles present 
for film water and the plant food it contains. Therefore " fineness is rich- 
ness." A good soil may contain from 250 to 450 billion particles per ounce, 
and the aggregate surface of all the particles in one cubic foot may meas- 
ure from one to four acres. 

The life and growth of plants require a very large quantity 
of water, which they obtain entirely from the soil. Average 
farm crops use from 300 to 400 tons of water per acre. Plant 
roots absorb food only when it is dissolved in soil water, and 
the solution is so weak that to get food enough they must use 
great quantities of water, most of which escapes by evaporation 
through the leaves. Under ordinary conditions, production is 
almost directly proportional to the water supply during the 
growing season. Including losses by run-off and evaporation 



148 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



from the soil, a rainfall of from 5 to 25 inches just before and 
during the growing season is necessary to produce farm crops. 
In middle latitudes the rainfall of autumn and winter is of 
little benefit to the farmer, who must depend upon the rains of 
spring and early summer. 

Irrigation does not add anything to the actual quantity of 
water on the land, but utilizes for crop growing water which would 
naturally evaporate or run off to the sea. Water is obtained 
from lakes, streams, and wells, and is distributed over the fields at 
times and in quantities which can be regulated according to the 
needs of the crop (Figs. 36, 60, 90, 94). The product per acre of 
irrigated lands far exceeds that of lands naturally supplied with 
water, but the area of lands which can be irrigated is relatively 
very small. Irrigated lands in India aggregate 25 million acres, 

in Egypt 6 million, in 
Italy 3.7 million, and 
in the United States 
10.5 million. The area 
in the United States 
which may possibly 
be irrigated is esti- 
mated at 75 million 
acres, which is less 
than one tenth of the 
total arid region. 

The Conservation 
of Soils. — Soil is es- 
pecially subject to ero- 
sion, and is carried 
away by every stream, 
to be finally deposited 
in the sea. In some 
places the soil is liable 
to removal by the wind. A covering of vegetation, especially a 
forest, largely prevents the washing away of soil. On forested 




Fig. 143. 



-Soil wash and gullying, North Carolina. 
(U.S.G.S.) 



SOILS 149 

slopes the cutting of the trees is often followed by rapid gully- 
ing and destruction of the land for any useful purpose, while 
the valleys below suffer almost as much from excess of mantle 
rock brought down and deposited. In old countries a series of 
" breaks " or dams is sometimes built across the valley to stop 
the waste of soil. All such regions are more valuable if kept in 
forest, which can be thinned out at intervals and renewed by 
planting. Many species of grass, sedge, rush, willows, and other 
plants which form a dense network of roots are useful as soil 
binders. 

Soil and Population. — The population which any given 
region, or the world as a whole, can support is strictly limited 
by the amount of water available for crops. This is as true 
in humid as in arid regions. Notwithstanding the large pro- 
portion of the face of the earth occupied by water, less than 
half the land surface has sufficient rainfall to support a moder- 
ately dense population, and one third of it is either frozen or 
too dry for agriculture. As long as men depended chiefly upon 
agriculture for a living, population was necessarily most dense 
on fertile and easily cultivated soils, and these were generally 
alluvial. To-day the density of population is greatest in manu- 
facturing regions, where the character of the soil is of no im- 
portance. Facilities for transportation are so great that food 
and clothing may be supplied from distant lands, and the best 
agricultural regions have a relatively sparse or medium popu- 
lation. In the most advanced industrial countries, like the 
United States, the population of purely agricultural counties and 
states has remained stationary, or has grown actually smaller 
for several decades. This is due to improvements in farm 
machinery, which enable one man now to do the work done by 
four or five men fifty years ago. 



CHAPTER XI 
THE SEA 

The sea is a continuous body of salt water which covers about 
72 per cent of the surface of the earth crust. The average depth 
of the sea is a little over two miles, and its greatest about six 
miles. Its depth in proportion to its area would be like that of 
a lake three miles wide and one to six feet deep, and would be 
represented on a seven-foot globe by a film of water from one 
twentieth to one third of an inch thick. The relative shallow- 
ness of the ocean basins is of importance from the fact that 
they are not deep enough to hold all the water, which conse- 
quently spreads over the low margins of the continental plat- 
form and covers more than one sixth of it (p. 24). The sea 
surrounds four great land masses and thousands of islands, and 
is divided into five great oceans (Figs. 16, 17, 18, 150). 

The Oceans. — The Southern Ocean forms a continuous belt 
around the earth south of 40 S. Lat., and is a means of com 
munication between the other oceans which open into it. It is 
about 1,600 miles wide, comprises about one fifth of the sea area, 
and is more than two miles deep. 

The Pacific Ocean comprises about 40 per cent of the sea area, 
or nearly 30 per cent of the face of the earth. It is roughly 
circular in outline, with a diameter of about 10,000 miles, and 
is nearly surrounded by land except on the south. Its bed is 
broken by numerous ridges which bear upon their crests thou 
sands of small islands. It also contains many holes where the 
water is five or six miles deep. 

The Atlantic Ocean is 9,000 miles long, and between Africa 
and South America only 1,700 miles wide. Its greatest depths 
are from four to five miles. It forms a broad channel of com 

150 



: 



THE SEA 151 

munication between the north and south polar waters. It com- 
prises about one fourth of the sea area. 

The Indian Ocean has been called " half an ocean " because 
it extends northward only to the tropic of Cancer. Its area is 
about one eighth of the whole sea, and its average depth is over 
two miles. 

The Arctic Ocean is small and nearly inclosed by land at about 
70 N. Lat. An opening 1,200 miles wide between Norway and 
Greenland connects it with the north Atlantic. A large part of 
it is covered with drifting ice, and its depths are little known. 
Soundings by Nansen north of Eurasia and by Peary at the 
pole show that it is more than 9,000 feet deep. 

Sea Water. — The sea water contains about 3! per cent of 
mineral matter in solution, more than three fourths of which is 
common salt. Most of this mineral matter has probably been 
brought by rivers from the land. While sea water contains 
minute quantities of almost every known element, more than 
97 per cent of the dissolved matter consists of salts of soda, 
magnesia, and lime. The gases of the atmosphere penetrate the 
sea in varying proportions to the bottom. The quantity of 
oxygen diminishes and that of carbon dioxide increases with 
increasing depth. 

Temperature. — The temperature of the surface water of the 
sea is between 30 and 40 F. near the poles and between 70 
and 90 near the equator (Fig. 150). The temperature of the 
deep bottom water varies from 29 in the polar regions to 35 
under the equator. 

The layer of water warmer than 40 is nowhere more than 4,800 feet 
deep, and generally much less. Eighty per cent of all the water in the 
sea has a temperature below 40 . This is due to the fact that the heat of 
the sun does not penetrate the water more than about 600 feet, and to 
the creep of the cold bottom water of the Southern Ocean into the Pacific, 
Atlantic, and Indian, crowding the warmer equatorial waters upward. 
Owing to many physical causes the temperature of the sea is more constant 
than that of the land, the seasonal change being seldom more than 10 or 20 
degrees. Lands swept by winds from the sea have an oceanic climate 



152 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

marked by relatively small differences of temperature between summer 
and winter. 

Pressure and Density. — The pressure of sea water is equal in all direc- 
tions and increases at the rate of more than one ton per square inch for 
every mile of depth. The density varies with the temperature, pressure, 
and quantity of salts in solution. The density of the surface water is 
greatest in tropical regions of small rainfall and rapid evaporation, and 
least in the equatorial regions of heavy rainfall and the polar regions of 
freezing and melting ice. 

Waves. — Waves are usually produced by the friction of the 
wind. They present a series of parallel or irregular ridges and 
hollows which follow one another across the surface of the water. 
They are very superficial, seldom disturbing the water to a 
depth greater than ioo feet. Each wave appears to consist of 
a ridge or mound of water moving forward with the wind, but 




Fig. 144. — Breakers. 

in the open sea the water really moves up and down in a circular 
or elliptical path. A field of standing grain in the wind or a 
cloth shaken up and down may be thrown into similar waves. 
Waves 10 or 15 feet high lift and drop a vessel about ten 
times a minute. Storm waves sometimes reach a height of 
50 feet and travel 60 miles an hour, passing a given point at the 
rate of about four a minute. In shallow water the front slope 
of the wave becomes steeper and the crest higher, until finally 



THE SEA 153 

it falls forward and breaks, rolling over and over like a barrel. 
On a shelving shore such breakers may reach a height of 100 feet 
or more, and hurl forward many tons of water, striking blows 
like a hammer and pounding cliffs, breakwaters, and lighthouses 
to pieces. The undertow, or backward rush of the water along 
the sea bottom, is efficient in grinding up and removing rock 
fragments. 

Waves are the principal agents in breaking down the seaward margin of 
the land and in building beaches, bars, and spits (p. 129). Their effects 
are on the whole unfavorable to man by rendering navigation more difficult 
and dangerous and the coasts of the land less accessible. Shipwrecks are 
generally caused by waves. Mariners sometimes succeed in calming the 
sea and making a space of relatively smooth water around a ship by pour- 
ing overboard a quantity of oil. The floating oil so reduces the friction of 
the wind upon the surface of the water that wave motion nearly ceases. 

Tides. — The level of the sea is subject to a regular, periodic 
rise and fall which is called the tide. It varies in amount at 
different places. On the deep, open ocean it is probably less 
than one foot. On the coasts of oceanic islands it is not more 
than six or seven feet, while at the heads of funnel-shaped inlets, 
such as the Bay of Fundy, it amounts to as much as fifty feet. If 
we should watch the tide from any point along the coast at low 
water, we should see the rocks, bars, and portions of the beach 
and sea bottom'laid bare; then the water would slowly flow or 
creep up for several hours and cover them. High water would 
be followed by an ebb or fall, lasting six hours or more. The 
interval between two periods of high water or low water is 
twelve hours and twenty-six minutes, but it is not always equally 
divided between ebb and flow, the rise being generally more rapid 
than the fall. 

The difference of level between high and low water varies not only at 
different places but at different times at the same place. These phenomena 
must have been observed by all peoples who have lived along the shore of 
the sea, and it must have been noticed at a very early period that the times 
of high and low water have some relation to the position and phases of 
the moon. The connection between the moon and the tides was not un- 
derstood, however, until Newton's discovery of the law of gravitation. 



154 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



If the earth were a globe of water, it is easy to understand 
how the attraction of the moon would draw it out of shape and 




Fig. 145. — High tide, North. Haven, Maine. (Blackwelder and Barrows, Ehmsnls of Geology.) 

produce a slight elongation in the direction of a line connecting 
the earth and moon. The effect upon the spheroidal shell of 
sea water is the same as though it were a complete sphere. 




Tig. 146. — Low tide, North Haven, Maine. (Blackwelder and Barrows, Elements of Geology.) 

If the moon were always above the same point on the earth, 
there would always be high water at that point, the moon would 
cause no change in the level of the sea anywhere, and conse- 
quently there would be no lunar tides; but as the earth rotates 



THE SEA 155 

on its axis from west to east, the point directly under the moon 
and the other points of high and low water travel around the 
earth from east to west at the same rate as the apparent motion 
of the moon. 

Thus every part of the sea has two stages of high water and two .of low 
water within the time between two transits of the moon over any given 
place (24 hours and 52 minutes). The period is more than twenty-four 
hours, because the moon is actually moving in its orbit eastward in the 



EIRST* ;-QUARTER 



MCON 




Tide ■\ ; h Tide 



Fig. 147. 

same direction as the rotation of the earth, and after one rotation of the 
earth on its axis, it takes fifty-two minutes for any given point on the earth 
to overtake the moon. 

The sun also produces tides in the sea in the same manner as the moon, 
but on account of its greater distance the solar tides are much smaller than 
the lunar. At new moon and full moon the sun, earth, and moon are all 
in the same straight line, as shown in Fig. 147, and the lunar and solar 
tides combine to produce a greater rise and fall than usual, called spring 
tide. At intermediate periods the sun and moon act at right angles to 
each other and produce a smaller rise and fall than usual, called neap 
tide. 

The increased rise of the tide in shallow water near shore, in river mouths, 
and in wide-mouthed indentations of the coast enables large vessels to pene- 
trate the land. The inward movement of water during a rising tide gives 
sufficient depth and a favorable current for ingoing vessels, and the out- 
ward flow during a falling tide is favorable for outgoing vessels. These 
conditions are especially important on coasts where the continental shelf 
is wide, and in estuaries and drowned valleys like those of eastern United 
States, the British Isles, France, the Netherlands, and Germany. 



156 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

Currents. — Under the influence of the prevailing winds the 
surface waters of the sea are driven in wide, shallow streams, 
or currents, from shore to shore. Deflected by the land masses, 
they perform great circuits in the ocean basins on each side of 
the equator. The map on pages 1 60-1 61 shows the location and 
direction of the principal ocean currents. What may be called 
the trunk streams are the north and south equatorial currents, 
which, under the influence of the trade winds (Figs. 170, 171, 
172), flow westward in broad belts and are turned northward 
and southward by the eastern shores of the continents. Helped 
on by the prevailing westerly winds, they recross the oceans in 
middle latitudes, and, returning toward the equator on western 
shores, complete the circuits. The eddy in the north Atlantic 
is joined by a large branch from the south equatorial current 
and attains exceptional speed, depth, and temperature off the 
coast of Florida, where it is called the Gulf Stream. This cur- 
rent loses velocity and depth, and, north of 40 N. Lat., spreads 
out into a sheet of warm surface water which drifts at the rate 
of a mile or so a day far into the Arctic Ocean. 

This large body of warm water in the north Atlantic raises the tempera- 
ture of the winds which blow over it and contributes to the mildness and 
humidity of climate in western Europe. The water returns from the 
Arctic Ocean southward along the east coast of Greenland and Labrador, 
forming a reversed eddy of cold Water. 

In the north Pacific the Japan Current, or Kurosiwo, behaves in a similar 
manner. 

In middle southern latitudes the circuit in each ocean is partly 
merged into the west wind drift, which circulates eastward 
around the earth in the Southern Ocean. In the northern part 
of the Indian Ocean the direction of circulation is reversed in 
winter by the northeast monsoons (Fig. 150). 

As a general rule between 40 N. Lat. and 40 S. Lat. the currents bring 
relatively warm water to the eastern coasts of the continents and relatively 
cool water to the western coasts. In higher latitudes this rule is reversed. 
By this circulation of waters the temperatures of the oceans are partly 
equalized, and, through the influence of the water upon the temperature of 



THE SEA 



157 



the winds blowing over it, the climate of the continents is greatly modified. 
The most notable effects, due in part to the ocean currents, are the mild 
winter temperatures and heavy rainfall of western Europe and northwestern 
North America, and the cool summers of northeastern North America and 
Asia and southwestern South America. 

Ocean currents bring food supply to fixed marine animals such as the 
coral polyps, which flourish best in the strong, warm equatorial currents, 
and also to fish which swarm in the cool waters off Newfoundland, Alaska, 
Norway, and Japan. Most of the numerous small islands in the Pacific, 




Fig. 148. — Coral reef, Australia. 

and some in other tropical waters, have been built by coral animals, which 
flourish in such numbers that their skeletons, converted into limestone 
rock, are piled up by the waves into low ring-shaped reefs and islands. 

Economic Relations. — The sea never affords a home or fixed 
habitation for man. It is essentially a wide, empty space which 
he cannot occupy or permanently control, but which he can 
cross whenever he chooses. It therefore plays two contrasted 
parts in human affairs. It is at the same time a barrier which 
separates one people from another, and a broad, free, uncrowded 
highway of communication between them. It keeps nations 
apart and forms the most easily defended boundary of states, 



158 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



and it brings all the nations of the world together, enabling them 
to exchange goods and ideas. It is generally barren and unpro- 
ductive in itself, but the people who use it most become rich, 
powerful, and enlightened. 

With the introduction of steam vessels in the early part of the nineteenth 
century, the transformation of the sea from a barrier of separation to a 
highway of communication was begun. The change may now be said to be 
complete, and constitutes the most important adaptation yet made by man 
to his environment. More than by any other means, the mobility and cir- 
culation of men and goods has been promoted by the use of the sea. Since 
man is essentially a land animal, adaptation to the sea is for him more 
difficult than to the land. Consequently the use of the sea has required and 
developed the highest types of intellect. It requires more skill and courage 
to command an ocean vessel than to run a railroad train. A modern first- 
class passenger and freight steamship or a battleship is the most com- 
plex and costly piece of mechanism on a large scale man has yet achieved. 
To construct and run it requires all the material and mental resources of 
engineering. The profits and rewards of ocean traffic are so large that the 
great nations of the world rival one another in the invention and con- 
struction of merchant vessels to carry their goods, and of warships to 

protect them. 




' S" '-7<r±,\ '• - .Aft L-7 ■ rt<S^vMt C, ■ 






Panama canal zone 

AND ROUTE OF THE 
PANAMA CANAL 

SCALE OF MILES 



LO 




Fig. 149. — Map of Panama Canal and Canal Zone. 



The sea promotes civi- 
lization also by bringing 
people into many-sided 
relationships. Along its 
land boundaries a nation 
is in contact with one or 
a few foreign neighbors, 
but if it has even one 
seaport it is brought in 
contact with people from 
nearly every part of the 
world. Sea trade has 
been greatly modified 
and facilitated by cut- 
ting through the narrow 



THE SEA 159 

isthmuses at Suez and Panama. To go around the world by 
sea, it is no longer necessary to sail around the Cape of Good 
Hope and Cape Horn, but by the short-cut canals the whole 
voyage may be made between 35° N. Lat. and the equator. 

The great maritime nations have cooperated in making a careful survey 
of all the coasts of the world, and have published charts showing the depth 
of water, the trend of coast lines, and the position of islands and light- 
houses, and giving sailing directions for the. use of mariners. The great 
commercial peoples live around the north Atlantic, which thus becomes the 
oceanic center of the world. The north Pacific bids fair to become in the 
near future a secondary center of scarcely less importance. 



Classification of Coasts (Fig. 150). 

(1) Folded mountain coasts, elevated. — Slopes steep above and below 
water. Coastal plains and shelves absent or narrow. Large rivers, deltas, 
and estuaries rare. Fiords in high latitudes. Sea cliffs almost continuous. 
Few harbors available for seaports. 

(2) Folded mountain coasts, depressed. — Coast line double. Outer line 
of partly submerged mountain chains, forming festoons of islands. Slopes 
very steep. Inner line of deep border seas with numerous gulfs, bays, and 
peninsulas. Very complex. Harbors numerous. 

(3) Fault scarp coasts. — High, smooth, and unindented. Coastal plains 
and shelves absent or narrow. Estuaries and drowned valleys absent. 
Deltas at the mouths of large rivers only. Fiords in high latitudes. 
Harbors rare. 

(4) Plain coasts. — Bordered by wide coastal plains and shelves. Slopes 
gentle. Barrier beaches, lagoons, and dunes extensive. Estuaries and 
drowned valleys numerous. 



Fig. 150 
MEAN ANNUAL, SURFACE TEMPERATURES 
SURFACE CURRENTS IN NORTHERN WINTER. 
AND COAST LINES 




CHAPTER XII 
COASTS AND PORTS 

Independently of the work of standing water, the large 
features and general character of coast lines depend primarily 
upon the present and past relief of the land. If in the past 
the land has stood higher than at present and the streams have 
graded their valleys down to base level, then sinking of the land 
drowns all the bars, lets tide water far up the valleys, and con- 
verts them into long, deep arms of the sea. Many of the best 
harbors in the world are such drowned valleys, or estuaries (Figs. 
153, 154, 155). A coast line which is rising, or has been recently 
elevated, is established upon what was formerly sea bottom, and 
is therefore smooth and only slightly indented by stream valleys. 
It is apt to be bordered by cliffs and to present few inlets to 
the land. The gulfs and bays are generally curved in outline 
and wide open to the sea (Fig. 43). 

The Southern Continents. — Of all the continents Africa has 
the simplest and smoothest coast line (Figs. 16, 150). More than 
half of it is bordered by plateaus and mountains, and between 
Guinea and Good Hope and on the Red Sea it is bounded by a 
fault scarp. Much of the Sahara coast is low, but there are no 
rivers or inlets except the mouth of the Nile. The coast of Aus- 
tralia resembles that of Africa. But one large river enters the 
sea. The south coast is smooth and cliffed, with but one large 
break, — Spencer Gulf, — -which is a rift valley (p. 64). The east 
coast is bordered on the land side by mountains and on the sea 
side by the Great Barrier coral reef. On the Atlantic side of South 
America a coastal plain extends from the northern end of the 
Andes Mountains to Cape St. Roque, and from the mouth of the 
Plata to the Strait of Magellan, including the deltas of the three 

162 



COASTS AND PORTS 



163 



great rivers of the continent. Between Cape St. Roque and the 
Plata low plateaus and mountains rise from a shore which is 
little indented. 

The Pacific Coast of America. — The Pacific coast of America 
extends about 12,000 miles along the foot of a lofty mountain 
system. The slopes above and below sea level are steep, and 
the streams are generally insignificant. Only the Colorado and 
the Columbia cut through the mountain barrier 
and bring large volumes of water from the in- 
terior. One flows into the Gulf of Califor- 
nia, the only long sea arm on the coast 
and probably a rift valley. The other 
;^\ has a wide estuary. South of 40 S. 
Lat. and north of 50 N. Lat. this 
coast is cut into a ragged fringe 
of long, narrow, steep-walled in- 
lets and high peninsulas, bor- 
dered by outlying islands. 
These arms of the sea 
are of great depth and 
often extend as far 
below sea level as 
their walls rise above 
it. They are called 
canals and fiords. 
These coasts are 
swept by west winds from the ocean, which bring a heavy rain- 
fall. On account of large volume and steep slope the streams 
have great erosive power, and are able to cut valleys far back 
into the mountains. On account of high latitude and altitude 
the snowfall is heavy enough to fill the valleys with ice and to 
bring about glaciation, which has been more extensive in the 
past than it is at present. The ice has widened and deepened 
the valleys, converting them into fiords (Figs. 106, 152, 153, 
154). The great depth of water, amounting in some cases to 




Fig. 151. — Canal coast, Alaska. 



164 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



4,000 feet, is partly due to sinking of the land. Glaciation has 
been more severe on some coasts than on others, but all fiord 
coasts owe their distinctive characters to ice action. Fiord coasts 
occur also in Norway, Iceland, Scotland, New Zealand, Green- 
land, and Spitzbergen. 

Even after the ice has disappeared fiord coasts are generally unfavorable 
for human occupation. Deep harbors are superabundant, but the shores are 
so high and precipitous that landing is difficult, and there is little room for 




Fig. 152. — Fiord, Norway. Glacier in the distance. 

settlement. Land resources are small and population sparse. The people 
are compelled to take to the sea for a living and become fishermen and 
sailors. In the past, when the sea was not so well policed as at present, 
the Norwegian fiords were the nesting places of pirates, who raided and 
plundered their richer neighbors. The scenery of the Norwegian fiords 
has long been famous as among the grandest, but is inferior to that of 
Alaska, where the combination of sea, mountain, forest, and glacier is un- 
rivaled in the world. Fiord coasts of a mild type, such as those of Scotland 
and Maine, attract thousands of visitors by their agreeable summer climate 
and picturesque scenery. 

Asia. — The Pacific coast of Asia is characterized by a series 
of island chains arranged in festoons which inclose deep border 



COASTS AND PORTS 



l6 5 



CASCO BAY 

MAINE 

SCALE OF MILES 
01234567 




A\<Ul / Fa :;■■:, <M ; . 



WyM.s 




HALFWAY ROOK 



Fig. 153. — Part of the Maine coast. Fiords and islands. 



seas between them and the mainland. The islands are moun- 
tainous and volcanic, and their slopes plunge seaward into very- 
deep water (Fig. 16). It looks as if the earth crust of Asia 
had slid toward the sea and wrinkled up around the edge. The 
mainland coast abounds in peninsulas, bays, and gulfs of varied 
size and character, and many large, navigable rivers flow into 
the border seas. This coast in complexity and accessibility is 
unequaled elsewhere in the world. 

Between the South China Sea and the Bay of Bengal the ends of parallel 
mountain ranges project into the sea, but the rivers have smoothed the coast 
line by filling in the spaces between the ranges. The head of the Bay of 
Bengal is occupied by the enormous delta of the Ganges-Brahmaputra. 
The coasts of India, Persia, and Arabia are denned by lines of fracture, 
and are generally high and without indentations. The lowlands about the 



1 66 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

mouth of the Indus and the nearly inclosed Persian Gulf lead to valleys 
which are desert, except for irrigation. 

North Atlantic Coasts. — The north Atlantic exceeds all other 
oceans in the number, variety, and area of its coast waters. 
The basins of the Caribbean Sea and Gulf of Mexico are very 
deep and bordered by submerged mountain ranges forming a 
festoon of islands similar to those of Pacific Asia. The Medi- 
terranean Sea with its branches, on account of its area, depth, 
and complexity, might be considered a distinct ocean basin. 
It is nearly divided by mountain ranges, partly submerged, 
into four great basins and several smaller ones. Its varied 
character is partly due to the faulting and sinking of great 
blocks of the earth crust. Inclosed by the shores of three con- 
tinents, it has been a center of human activity and civilization 
for five thousand years. 

The North and Baltic seas are shallow, but penetrate the land almost as 
far as the Mediterranean. On the American side the Gulf of St. Lawrence, 
leading to the chain of Great Lakes, occupies an analogous position. The 
shallow pan of Hudson Bay occupies a sunken portion of the interior 
plain of North America behind the highland of Labrador, as the White Sea 
lies on the European, plain behind Scandinavia. 

The American and European coasts of the north Atlantic are low and 
not bordered by highlands except in the north. Many of the river mouths 
are drowned, , forming estuaries. The American and European Mediter- 
raneans are so nearly tideless that the rivers have been able to build great 
deltas such as those of the Orinoco, Mississippi, Ebro, Rhone, Po, and Nile. 

Arctic Coasts. — The coasts of the Arctic Ocean are almost 
everywhere low and bordered by a wide coastal plain and shelf. 
The White Sea and the Gulf of Ob are the only important arms. 
Large rivers, such as the Mackenzie, Petchora, Yenisei, and 
Lena, have built deltas. On account of the severe climate, and 
the persistence of snow and ice on land and sea, the Arctic 
coasts are comparatively inaccessible and unfavorable for human 
occupation. 

Coast Factors. — The degree of indentation of a coast may be expressed 
mathematically in different ways. If the length of the actual mainland 



COASTS AND PORTS 1 67 

coast line of each continent is divided by the circumference of a circle 
having an area equal to that of the continent, the following ratios, or coast 
factors, are obtained: 

North America 4.9 Australia 2.0 

Europe 3.5 South America 2.0 

Asia 3.2 Africa 1.8 

That is, North America has a coast line nearly five times as long as the 
shortest possible, while the coast line of Africa is less than twice as long as 
necessary. 

If the mainland area of each continent is divided by the length of its 
coast line, the following ratios are obtained : 



Europe has 1 mile of coast line to 151 square mi 



North America 

Australia 

Asia 

South America 

Africa 



164 
242 
368 
386 
593 



les of area. 



That is, Europe has nearly four times as much coast line in proportion to 
its area as Africa, and North America has more than twice as much as South 
America. These facts help to explain why Africa is shut in, isolated, and 
backward, while Europe has been the center of the highest civilization for 
3,000 years, and why North America has become the chief center of civil- 
ization outside of Europe. 

Ports. — A harbor is primarily a place of shelter from storms. 
A port is a gateway or place of entrance. In a commercial 
sense a port is a place where vessels are loaded and unloaded. 
The existence of a good port depends upon many conditions: 

(1) Accessibility from the water; that is, a channel deep enough 
for large vessels, not too crooked, free from rocks and shoals, and 
not subject to fogs. 

(2) A harbor well protected from winds and waves, free from 
ice and strong currents, large enough to furnish anchorage for 
many vessels, and deep enough to permit them to float near 
shore. 

(3) A long, low coast line , where wharves may be built to bring 
vessels and vehicles alongside of each other. 

(4) Accessibility from the land by river, canal, or railroads. 



1 68 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

River Ports. — The great ports of the world are, with few 
exceptions, situated at or near the mouths of rivers, usually as 
far inland as large vessels can go. The distance of the port 
from the river mouth is greatly increased by the drowning of 
the lower valley and the occurrence of tides. These conditions 
may convert a coastal plain with small, shallow rivers, a line 
of barrier beaches, and a wide coastal shelf, into a first-class 
commercial seaboard. The Atlantic coasts of North America 
and Europe furnish striking examples (Fig. 16). 

Delta Ports. — In the delta of a large river there is usually 
one distributary channel which is deep enough for ocean vessels, 
and on this, at some point where the land is safe from tidal over- 
flow, a seaport is apt to be located. New Orleans, the Rhine 
ports, and Calcutta are examples. The growth of a sand bar 
off the mouth of the channel and the shifting of the discharge 
to some other channel are difficulties liable to occur. 

New Orleans, eighty miles from the sea, is above the point where the 
Mississippi divides into the " passes " of the " goosefoot." A sufficient 
depth of water was maintained through the South Pass for about thirty 
years by Captain Eads's jetties, which are embankments designed to nar- 
row the channel, quicken the current, and compel it to remove the bar. 
A jetty is now being built at the mouth of the Southwest Pass (Fig. 69) . 

Lagoon Harbors lie behind beaches, bars, spits, or reefs. They are well 
protected, but are usually too shallow to admit the largest vessels without 
artificial deepening (Fig. 28). Galveston, Tex., Venice in the Adriatic, and 
Danzig on the Baltic, are situated on or behind barrier beaches. 

Fiord Harbors. — Fiords afford excellent harbors as far as 
depth of water, clear entrance, and complete protection are 
concerned, but are seldom favorable for ports on account of 
high, steep shores and inaccessibility from the land. It is only 
where these features exist in moderate degree that considerable 
seaports occur, as Christiania, Norway, and Glasgow, Scotland. 
In the latter case the fiord cuts entirely through the marginal 
highland and penetrates the lowland, where the little river 
Clyde has been enlarged to a canal which admits vessels of all 
sizes. 



COASTS AND PORTS 169 

Where the sinking of the land has drowned a series of valleys parallel 
with the coast, a chain of islands is separated from the mainland by 
straits, sounds, and canals (p. 163), which form an " inside passage," protected 
from the open sea and traversable by large vessels. The northwest coast 
of North America and the east shore of the Adriatic furnish striking ex- 
amples (Fig. 151). 

Round Inlets. — A coast inlet with a rounded or semicircular outline is 
called a cuvette, meaning a bowl or basin. Cuvettes are sometimes due to 
faulting along a succession of curves, as on the west coast of Italy and 
south coast of France. The greatest seaports of the Mediterranean — 
Marseilles, Genoa, and Naples — are situated upon such bays. 

Deep Straits connecting large bodies of water are highways of com- 
merce, and are apt to develop important seaports, of which Constanti- 
nople and Singapore are examples. 

Artificial Harbors. — All harbors have to be improved more or 
less by artificial works to accommodate large shipping. Wharves 
must be built, alongside of which vessels may be tied, and facili- 
ties for transferring cargoes must be furnished. Often channels 
must be deepened by dredging, and in some cases canals are dug 
to admit ocean vessels to inland cities. 

Ships reach Amsterdam only by the North Sea Canal, recently con- 
structed. A canal 35 miles long has converted Manchester from an in- 
land manufacturing city to a seaport and financial center. At Hamburg 
$44,000,000 has been spent in providing wharves and basins, and London 
is facing the necessity of spending $100,000,000 to improve the port and hold 
supremacy in trade. Large sums have recently been spent in making artificial 
harbors at Puerto Mexico, and Salina Cruz, the termini of the railroad across 
the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, in Mexico, and at Colon and Panama where 
the Panama Canal reaches the sea. 

In cases where it is impossible to extend the sea into the land, the land 
is built out into the sea in the form of a breakwater, which creates an arti- 
ficial lagoon harbor behind it. At San Pedro Bay, now the harbor of Los 
Angeles, California, the breakwater is nearly two miles long. 

Lake Ports are generally situated on river harbors and are 
improved by dredging the river mouth and building a break- 
water outside. The harbors of Chicago, Cleveland, and Buffalo 
are of this character. 



170 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 




Fig. 154. — Drowned valley of the Hudson: a fiord. 

The Port of New York. — New York is situated upon a harbor 
of a mild fiord type, combined with a lagoon. The lower Hudson 
is a fiord which has been partly filled with sediment. The East 
River and Long Island Sound constitute an " inside passage " 
between the mainland and Long Island. The fiord and passage 
expand at their junction into the deep upper bay. The tidal 
currents are strong enough to scour out the channels. The 
shores furnish fifty miles of wharf line with deep water, and there 
is room enough to build piers at right angles to the shore, so as 
to accommodate a large number of ships. The lower bay is an 
antechamber of an entirely different character. It is a shallow 
indentation partly fenced from the open sea by the barrier beach 
of Coney Island and the spit of Sandy Hook, both of which 
are growing farther into the bay and threatening to close it. 
Much difficulty and expense are incurred in maintaining a 
channel deep enough for the largest vessels. 



CHAPTER XIII 



THE ATMOSPHERE 

Composition. — The atmosphere, or gaseous portion of the 
earth, forms a complete spheroidal shell which surrounds the 
solid and liquid globe, and not only rests upon the surface of 
land and sea, but also penetrates them to a great depth. Its 
thickness, which is not definitely known, is certainly several 
hundred miles and may be many thousand. Its bulk is almost 
entirely made up of five gases, which are present in the pro- 
portions given in the following table: 

Composition of the Air 



Gas 



Nitrogen 

Oxygen 

Water vapor (average) . . . 

Argon 

Carbon dioxide (average) 

Air 



99-99 



Per cent of Volume 


Density 


76.95 


.971 


20.61 


1. 105 


I.40 


.624 


I. OO 


I.380 


O.03 


I-S29 



These gases are not united or combined in any way, but are 
almost entirely independent of one another. They act like five 
separate and distinct atmospheres occupying the same space at 
the same time. The space which each gas occupies is deter- 
mined by the balance between its own expansive force, tending 
to make it expand indefinitely, and gravitation, which holds it 
down to the earth. Carbon dioxide, being the heaviest of all 
these gases, does not extend so far upward as the others. Oxygen 
is a little heavier than nitrogen, and its relative proportion 
decreases in the upper air. Water vapor is the lightest of all, 

172 



THE ATMOSPHERE 



173 



but its existence as vapor is so far dependent upon a warm tem- 
perature that it is absent at great heights. 



12.4 
9.3 



6.8 



3.1 





^i^ii^ 


: 

REGI 


13 N OF CONSTANT TEMPERATURE / 












—67° 


F v 




^llllsills: 












REG1 


NiTfipGEN 
3N OP CONVECTION 




OXY 


GEN 


^-ARGONJ 












WATER , 1 

vapor : M 




CARBON 
DIOXIDE 



1.6 

3.5 



30, 



10 



20 



30 



70 



40 50 60 

VOLUME PER CENT 

Fig. 156. — Composition of lower atmosphere. 



90 



100 



Properties and Functions. — Oxygen combines freely with nearly all the 
elements, and in its numerous compounds forms about half of the whole 
weight of the globe. By the process of respiration it supports the life of 
all plants and animals, and it is the universal agent of combustion. By 
respiration, combustion, decay, and other processes of oxidation the quan- 
tity of oxygen in the air is being continually diminished. This loss is 
partly compensated by the oxygen set free from plants in the process of 
food manufacture. 

Nitrogen is extremely inert and enters into combination with other 
elements with difficulty. To it is due three fourths of the pressure and 
density of the air. Without it birds could not fly, clouds and smoke 
would settle to the ground, and the force of the wind and the loudness of 
sound would be proportionately diminished. 

Argon resembles nitrogen, with which it was confounded until near the 
end of the nineteenth century. 

Carbon dioxide (C0 2 ), or carbonic acid gas, is a compound of carbon 
and oxygen formed in the active, growing parts of plants and in the tissues 
of all animals and given off by them in the process of respiration. It is 
also produced by the combustion of all the ordinary forms of fuel, and 
sometimes escapes in large quantities from active volcanoes, old volcanic 
regions, and from many mineral springs. It forms the chief food supply 
of plants. The green parts of plants in the sunlight absorb carbon dioxide, 
separate it into its elements, retain the carbon, and give off the oxygen. 
Carbon dioxide plays an active part in rock formation, entering into combi- 
nation with lime and other bases to form limestones. It also enters largely 
into the composition of the bones and shells of animals. While the abso- 
lute quantity of carbon dioxide is the least of all the principal constituents 
of the air, the part it plays in the economy of nature is second to none. 



174' PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

Water vapor is supplied by evaporation from all damp surfaces, but 
chiefly from the sea. When cooled it condenses again into water and forms 
clouds, rain, and snow. The quantity present in the air at different times 
and places is very variable, amounting sometimes to five per cent. 

Dust. — The lower air generally contains more or less matter in the 
form of dust, analogous to the sediment suspended in running water. 
Dust consists of finely pulverized rock lifted by the wind or blown to great 
heights by volcanic eruptions, carbon particles from the smoke of fires, 
particles of plant and animal tissue, vegetable spores, bacteria, and other 
minute organisms. A cubic inch of air in dry regions may contain thousands 
of these particles. 

Dust in the air diffuses and scatters the rays of sunlight. In a dustless 
atmosphere all shadows would be a deep black, and the sky itself would 
appear black. Dust scatters the blue rays more than the red, and is the 
chief cause of the blue color of the sky and of the red and yellow colors at 
sunrise and sunset. Dust plays an important part in the formation of fog 
and clouds by supplying nuclei upon which the water vapor begins to con- 
dense. The dense fogs of London and other cities occur when the air is 
full of smoke particles. Minute organisms in the air furnish the germs of 
disease and the agents of decomposition, as when fermentation is set up in 
cider or grape juice exposed in open vessels. 

Temperature. — The temperature of the air is determined by 
the amount of heat received and absorbed from the sun and 
earth. As the sun heat passes through the air on its way to the 
earth, about one third of it "is absorbed by the air and goes to 
raise its temperature, while the remaining two thirds reaches 
the surface of the land and water. A part of this is reflected 
back without warming the earth, and another part, being ab- 
sorbed, goes to raise or maintain the temperature of the land 
and water. The warm earth in turn warms the air next to 
it slightly by conduction and still more by radiating its heat 
upward. 

The lower air absorbs much more heat than the upper air, 
and consequently is maintained at a higher temperature. This 
is due largely to the presence of cloud, fog, dust, and smoke. 
The larger proportions of carbon dioxide and water vapor in 
the lower air also increase its absorptive power for heat. Cur- 



THE ATMOSPHERE 



175 




~-A 





O 



rents of warm air are constantly rising from land and water and 
cooling by expansion. In consequence of these conditions, the 
temperature of the atmos- 
phere falls at the rate of 

about one degree for every 

300 feet of ascent, from sea 

level up to a height of six 

or seven miles (Fig. 156). 
Distribution of Light and 

Heat. — If the earth were a 

flat disk and one side were 

always turned toward the 

sun, the sun's rays would 

strike everywhere at the 

same angle and every part 

of that side would be con- 
stantly and equally lighted 

and heated (Fig. 157, A). If 

a spheroidal earth stood 

still, the same half of it 

would be always lighted 

and warmed, but not uni- 
formly. The spot where the 

direct rays strike would be 
strongly lighted and would 
become very hot, but the 
more slanting rays would 
cause the light and heat to 
decrease in every direction 
to the margin of the hemi- 
sphere. The dark side of 
the earth would be uni- 
formly cold. Thus the light 
and heat belts would be arranged concentrically around the cen- 
ter of the lighted side (Fig. 157, B). If such an earth should 





D 




-E 



Fig- 157- —Distribution of light and heat on the 
earth under various conditions. 




lj6 



THE ATMOSPHERE 1 77 

begin to rotate with the sun directly over the equator, the 
light and heat belts would be strung out into zones extending 
around it parallel with the equator, the light and heat would 
decrease everywhere uniformly from the equator to the poles, 
and all places would have days and nights of equal length. Our 
earth is in about that condition in March and September (Fig. 
157, C). If a spheroidal, rotating earth should begin to revolve 
around the sun with its axis inclined so that the sun is not 
always over the equator, the light and heat belts would follow 
the sun, swinging back and forth, north and south, once in 
every revolution. The days and nights would not be of the 
same length at different places or> at the same place at different 
times. Thus a change of seasons would occur such as we have 
upon our earth (Fig. 157, D and E). 

Heat Belts. — A state of things exactly as described above 
exists on our earth so far as the light belts are concerned, which 
always extend around the earth parallel with the equator; but 
the heat belts are bent out of shape by land and water, by 
winds, and by ocean currents. The land is heated and cooled 
more rapidly than water, consequently continents are warmer 
in summer and colder in winter than oceans which receive the 
same amount of heat from the sun. In summer the heat belts 
are bent away from the equator over the land and toward the 
equator over the water; in winter, the reverse.. Heat belts 
cannot be bounded by parallels of latitude, like the tropics and 
polar circles, but by isotherms, or lines of equal temperature 
(Figs. 158, 159, 160), which are quite crooked. 

Winds and ocean currents carry their temperatures, whether warm or 
cold, to the regions toward which they move, and sweep the isotherms along 
with them. In general, currents of air or water moving from the equator 
carry warmth with them and bend the isotherms poleward, and currents 
moving toward the equator carry coolness and bend the isotherms equator- 
ward. 

The isotherms as a whole shift north and south with the seasons 
according to the varying angle of the sun's rays. They are not 
in exactly the same positions on any two successive days. Their 




'79 



180 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

positions in July and January, the months of extreme position, 
show the character and extent of the shifting (Figs. 159, 160). 
Instead of calculating the temperature by months, it may be 
calculated for a series of years, and the resulting isotherms show 
the mean annual temperatures (Fig. 158). 

Range of Temperature. — The mean annual temperature of 
any place is important, but the temperature of the warmest 
month and day, and that of the coldest month and day, are 
more important. The difference between the temperature of 
the warmest month and that of the coldest month at any place 
is called the annual range. The difference between the temper- 
ature of the warmest day and that of the coldest day is called 
the absolute annual range. The range of temperature is greater 
on land than on water in the same latitude. 

Bodies of water are warmed more slowly than land in the day and the 
summer, and cooled more slowly at night and in the winter. The relatively 
uniform temperature of the ocean throughout the year and the extreme 
variations of temperature on land cause a marked contrast between oceanic 
and continental climates. The range of temperature increases with latitude, 
because in the course of a year both the angle of the sun's rays and the 
length of day and night vary more toward the poles than near the equator. 
The range of temperature is greater in the northern hemisphere than in 
the southern on account of the large land areas in one and the expanse of 
water in the other (Fig. 161). 

The mean annual temperatures at London, New York, Seattle, and 
Yokohama are about the same, but the annual range at London and Seattle 
is about 20 degrees, and at New York and Yokohama about 40 degrees. 
This is due to the prevailing westerly winds, which blow from the ocean in 
one case and from the land in the other. 

Zones of Temperature. — - Along any meridian the tempera- 
ture changes gradually, but it is convenient to divide the face 
of the earth into zones bounded by certain definite isotherms. 
In middle and high latitudes the summer temperatures are far 
more important than the winter temperatures, because they 
determine what plants can grow, what crops can be raised, and 
the number of people any region can support. The annual iso- 
therm of 70 in each hemisphere is not far from the tropics, and 






THE ATMOSPHERE l8l 

is practically the limit of tropical plants such as palms, bananas, 
and dates. The isotherm of 50 for the warmest month in each 
hemisphere is about the polar limit of cereal grains and forest 
trees. Beyond that men maintain themselves only with great 
difficulty. These lines surround two caps of polar climate, be- 
tween which lies the whole habitable world. This again is 
divided into a zone of tropical climate and two zones of tem- 
perate climate, of which the northern is much wider than the 
southern and covers the most favorable regions for human life 
(Fig. 162). 

There are many schemes for dividing the earth into zones of tempera- 
ture, among which this is one of the simplest and most useful. For some 
purposes a more exact and detailed subdivision is necessary. 

Temperature Belts. — Temperatures above 70 may be called 
hot, between 70 and 50 temperate, and below 50 cold. If the 
isotherms of 70 and 50 for July and January are drawn on 
the same map, the result is a system of nine zones which show 
the annual and seasonal conditions of temperature with sufficient 
exactness (Fig. 164). 

In the equatorial zone, which lies approximately between the tropics, 
the average monthly temperature is above 70 at all seasons. The sub- 
tropical zones are hot with a temperate season, or temperate with a hot 
season. In the temperate zones the monthly temperature would be 
between 70 and 50 at all seasons, if it were not for the influence of the 
land masses. In the northern hemisphere these truly temperate condi- 
tions are reversed over nearly ail the land surface of the zone. In North 
America and Eurasia wide areas have hot summers and cold winters, and 
the climate deserves the name of intemperate. These regions have a tem- 
perate climate in spring and fall, a hot summer and a cold winter. In the 
southern hemisphere these intemperate conditions prevail only in small 
portions of South America and Australia. The rest of the zone is truly 
temperate. The cold temperate zones have a temperate climate with a 
cold season, or a cold climate with a temperate season. In the polar caps 
the monthly temperature is below 50 at all seasons. 

Pressure. — At sea level a cubic foot of air weighs about one 
ounce and a quarter, and the weight of all the air above sea 
level produces an average pressure of 14.74 pounds upon every 



184 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



Fig. 163. 



square inch of surface. This pressure is equal in all directions, 
— downwards, upwards, or sidewise at any angle. The pressure 
of the air is measured by the barometer. 

Density. — The air being easily compressed, its density is 
proportional to the pressure to which it is subjected, and con- 
sequently diminishes as the height above 
the sea increases. Density and pressure 
are also influenced by other conditions, of 
which temperature and humidity, or quan- 
tity of water vapor it contains, are the 
most important. When air is heated it 
expands and becomes less dense. The 
same effect is produced by the addition of 
water vapor. On warm, damp days the 
pressure and density are less, and the ba- 
rometer stands lower than on cold, dry 
days. 

The distribution of pressure is shown on a map 
by isobars, or lines drawn through places where 
the pressure is the same (Figs. 165, 166). 

Laws of Winds. — Of all the materials 
of the earth, the air is the. most mobile 
and sensitive to change. When air is 
heated or made more damp by the addi- 
tion of water vapor, it expands and be- 
comes less dense than the surrounding air, 
which crowds in from all sides and buoys 
the lighter air * upward. The updraf t in 
a chimney or over an open fire, and the slower movement of the 
air toward the fire, furnish familiar examples of convection cur- 
rents on a small scale. Every wind that blows is a part of a 
similar movement, in which gravitation pulls heavy air down- 
ward and compels light air to move upward. In the regions of 
ascending and descending air the movement is usually impercep- 
tible and a calm prevails, but between these regions, which may 



LJ in 



— Two forms of the 
barometer. 



i88 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



f V* V V 



AAUU 



WHY 



Fig. 167. — Pressure and direction of wind. 



be hundreds or thousands of miles apart, horizontal currents 
exist which constitute the surface winds. Where the pressure 

as measured by the 
barometer is high the 
air is heavy and set- 
tling; where the pres- 
sure is low the air 
is light and rising. 
Hence the first law: Winds always blowf"om regions of high pres- 
sure to regions of low pressure (Figs. 177-180). 

Gravitation acting alone would make air move from a region 
of high pressure to a region of low pressure by the shortest 
path, crossing the isobars at right angles, just as it makes water 
flow down a slope by the steepest course; but other influences 
make the course of the wind less direct. Second law: The rota- 
tion of the earth turns winds blowing from any direction to the 
right of a direct course in the northern hemisphere, and to the left 
in the southern. 

The greater the difference of pressure between two regions 
the faster the air moves. Third law: Where the isobars are close 
together the winds are steady and strong, and where the isobars are 
far apart the winds are light and shifting. 

Distribution of Pressure. — On account of the constantly high 
temperature near the equator the pressure there is generally low 
(Figs. 165, 166), but in middle latitudes the land is colder than 
the water in winter and warmer in summer, and this produces 
rounded or elliptical areas of high and low pressure which change 
their positions with the seasons. In the northern winter very 
high pressures prevail over the interior of Asia and North 
America, and low pressures over the north Atlantic and Pacific 
oceans. In summer the conditions are reversed. In the south- 
ern hemisphere the land masses never get cold enough to have 
higher pressures than the oceans. In winter (Fig. 165) a belt 
of high pressure extends along the southern tropic nearly around 
the earth, crossing land and sea except a gap in the south Pacific. 



THE ATMOSPHERE 



189 



In summer (Fig. 166) the heated continents break this belt into 
three parts, one over each ocean. In spite of the very low tem- 
peratures in the polar regions, the pressures there are generally 
low because there is less air above them. 

Cyclones and Anticyclones. — The winds blow outward from 
centers of high pressure in all directions. The movement starts 
along radial lines like the spokes of a wheel, but the rotation of 



SOUTHERN 



SOUTHERN 




Fig. 168. — Cyclone. 



Fig. 169. — Anticyclone. 



the earth (second law) changes it to a spiral movement clock- 
wise in the northern hemisphere and counterclockwise in the 
southern (Fig. 169). The winds blow inward toward centers of 
low pressure from all directions, but the rotation of the earth 
gives them a spiral motion counterclockwise in the northern hemi- 
sphere and clockwise in the southern (Fig. 168). As the winds 
approach the center, they are crowded into a narrower space, 
their velocity increases, and their paths become more nearly 
circular until a whirl or eddy is set up. The movement is like 
that of water running out through a hole in the bottom of a 
bowl, only the air escapes upward instead of downward. A 
mass of air moving spirally inward toward a center of low pres- 
sure is called a cyclone. The path of the wind in a cyclone in the 
northern hemisphere is a curve like the figure 6; in the southern 
hemisphere like a reversed 6. A mass of air moving spirally 
outward from a center of high pressure is called an anticyclone. 

Wind Belts. — The prevailing low pressures in the equatorial 
regions and the presence of areas of high pressure in the tropi- 
cal regions divide the earth into wind belts, which are more 
regular in the southern hemisphere than in the northern. Near 
the equator the air is always warm and rising, a condition which 



/ 1KOPIC CALMS \ 


(y 


u 


Wi/*; 


/s\ 






w 


\ R 


N'A'SV 


W 


\ TROPIC CALMP / 



IOO PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

produces a belt of equatorial calms. Between the equatorial 
calms and the southern tropical regions the general movement 

is toward the equator and westward, 
producing a belt of constant southeast 
trade winds. South of the southern 
tropical regions the air moves steadily 
and strongly eastward in a great spi- 
ral whirl around the polar region, pro- 
ducing a belt of almost constant west 
winds. The movement of air within 
the Antarctic circle is not well known. 
Between, the equatorial calms and 
the northern tropical regions is a belt of northeast trade winds, 
but these are not so regular and constant as the southeast trades. 
North of the northern tropical regions there is a belt of prevail- 
ing westerly winds, but on account of the large land masses, with 
their changing temperatures and pressures, these winds are not 
so regular and constant as the west winds of the southern hemi- 
sphere. There is something like a north polar whirl, but it is 
broken up by the areas of low pressure over the oceans in winter 
and over the continents in summer. Along the southern tropic 
and a little north of the northern tropic there are belts of rela- 
tively high pressure, where the air is descending, and from which 
the trades and westerly winds blow. These are called the tropical 
calms. The conditions in the southern hemisphere show what 
the planetary system of Winds would be if the land masses did 
not interfere. This ideal system, to which the actual system 
approaches more or less closely, is shown in Fig. 170, which 
should be carefully studied and used as a key to the actual 
system. 

The wind belts, like the temperature belts, shift north and 
south with the seasons, following the position of the vertical sun 
in the heavens (Figs. 165, 166, 171, 172). 

Monsoons. — The greatest disturbing influence in the wind 
system is the large land mass of Asia. In winter it is an area 



OCEAN WINDS. JULY AND AUGUST 




Less than 18 Miles an hour X VariabJe W!nds 



Over 



^ Steady 



Fig. i7i. 
OCEAN WINDS. JANUARY AND FEBRUARY 




Less than 13 Miles an hour —^Variable Winds 

St&ady 



Fig. 172. 
ior 



192 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

of low temperature and very high pressure, from which the winds 
blow outward in all directions (Fig. 172). In summer it is an 
area of high temperature and low pressure, which deflects the 
belt of calms far north of the equator (Fig. 171). At this season 
the southeast trades over the Indian Ocean cross the equator and, 
turning eastward, become the southwest monsoon, while over the 
western Pacific the northeast trades become southerly and south- 
easterly winds (Fig. 171). These directions are opposite to the 
wind directions in winter. Winds which are thus reversed with 
the seasons are called monsoons. Less important monsoon re- 
gions exist upon the west coasts of Africa and South America. 

Economic Relations. — Winds are of the greatest importance 
to the life of plants, animals, and men because they transfer 
great masses of air from one part of the earth to another. They 
carry the conditions of temperature and moisture which exist 
in the regions from which they come to the regions over which 
they blow, and as they go on they themselves gradually acquire 
new conditions. Winds blowing over warm waters become 
warm and laden with water vapor, which they let fall as rain 
upon the land. Winds from a large land mass are dry and may 
be the cause of desert conditions in lands to which they blow. 
Winds moving from a warmer to a colder region bring warm, 
damp weather, and winds blowing from a colder to a warmer 
region bring cool, dry weather. Winds blowing from the ocean 
against a mountain range or plateau bring heavy rainfall to the 
windward side and little or no rain to the leeward side (Fig. 185). 
Rising air is always cooled and generally causes cloud to form 
and rain to fall. Descending air is warmed, and brings clear, 
dry weather. 

Most changes of weather are due to changes in the direction of the 
wind. Some winds are agreeable and favorable to life; some bring suffer- 
ing, destruction, and death. Even light breezes effect a continual change 
of air, which brings more food to plants and animals and removes waste 
and injurious gases. 



CHAPTER XIV 
MOISTURE IN THE AIR 

Capacity and Humidity. — The atmosphere, as well as the 
ocean, is a great reservoir of water. Everywhere over the face 
of the earth the air contains a variable quantity of invisible 
vapor, which may amount to as much as rive per cent. If all 
the vapor in the air should be condensed and fall as rain, it 
would be sufficient to cover the whole face of the earth with 
water to the depth of one inch. Water is constantly evapo- 
rating from the sea, lakes, rivers, and land surface. Even ice 
evaporates, but the higher the temperature of the water the 
more rapid is the evaporation. The quantity of water vapor 
which can exist in any given space increases with the temperature 
of the vapor, whether the space is already filled with air or not. 
Warm air can contain more vapor than cold air because the air 
determines the temperature of the vapor in it. When the space 
or air contains all the vapor it can hold, it is said to be saturated. 
The table on page 194 gives the weight of vapor which can exist 
in a cubic foot of space or air at various temperatures. These 
quantities are called the capacity for vapor. 

When water evaporates it expands instantly to about 1,700 times its 
liquid volume, and the vapor rapidly diffuses itself through the air in 
the vicinity. The evaporation and diffusion 'are hastened by currents of 
air which carry the vapor away from the evaporating surface. The dry- 
ness or dampness of the air is measured not by its absolute humidity, or 
the quantity of vapor actually present in it, but by its relative humidity, or 
the ratio of its absolute humidity to its capacity. If the air out of doors 
is at a temperature of 32 , and contains two grains of vapor in each cubic 
foot, it is very damp, because it is nearly saturated; but if the same air 
is brought into the house and heated to 70°, it becomes very dry, because 

IQ3 



194 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



GRAINS OF WATER VAPOR IN A CUBIC FOOT OF SATURATED SPACE OR AIR AT 
VARIOUS TEMPERATURES 



IO° 


.776 


34° 


2 . 279 


58° 


5-37o 


82 


11.626 


12° 


•8 S 6 


36° 


2 


457 


6o° 


5 


745 


84° 


12.356 


14° 


.941 


3S° 


2 


646 


62 


6 


142 


86° 


13.127 


i6° 


I.O32 


40 ° 


2 


849 


64° 


6 


563 


88° 


J3-937 


i8° 


I. 128 


42° 


3 


064 


66° 


7 


009 


90 ° 


14.790 


20° 


1235 


44° 


3 


294 


68° 


" 7 


480 


92° 


15689 


22° 


1-355 


46° 


3 


539 


7°° 


7 


980 


94° 


16.634 


24° 


1.483 


48° 


3 


800 


72° 


8 


508 


96° 


17.626 


26° 


1.623 


5o° 


4 


076 


74° 


9 


066 


98° 


18.671 


28° 


1-773 


52° 


4 


372 


76 ° 


9 


655 


IOO° 


19.766 


30° 


1-935 


54° 


4 


685 


78 ° 


10 


277 


102 ° 


20.917 


32° 


2. 113 


56° 


5 


016 


8o° 


10 


934 


104 


22 . 125 



it is then only one fourth saturated. This is the reason why air in heated 
rooms in the winter is generally too dry for comfort and health, and pans 
of water should be placed where they will supply more moisture. 

Unsaturated air is always ready to take up more moisture, 
but if saturated air at any temperature is cooled a part of the 
vapor immediately condenses into water. If a bright tin cup 
is filled half full of warm water, and cold water or ice is added, 
the cup will generally get cold enough to cause a deposit of dew 
on the outside. The dew is formed by condensation of vapor 
from the air. This is the reason why a pitcher or glass of cold 
water will sometimes " sweat " in warm weather. 

If the water in the tin cup is stirred with a thermometer, the temperature 
observed at the moment of the first appearance of dew is called the dew 
point. It is the temperature of saturation, and from it the absolute humid- 
ity may be found by consulting the table. The capacity of the air may 
be found by noting its temperature and again consulting the table. The 
absolute humidity divided by the capacity gives the relative humidity. If 
the temperature of the air is 70 , its capacity is 7.980 grains to the cubic 
foot. If the dew point is 40 , the absolute humidity of the air is 2.849 
grains, and its relative humidity is 2.849 -*■ 7-Q8o, or 35.7 per cent. That 
is, the air is 35.7 per cent full, and is moderately dry. 

Condensation. — When air is cooled below its dew point, 
some of the vapor condenses into dew, frost, fog, cloud, rain, or 
snow. The atmosphere is cooled and its vapor condensed by 
several processes. 






MOISTURE IN THE AIR 



195 



1. Expansion. — Whenever air rises it expands, and, without any trans- 
fer of heat to other bodies, it is cooled one degree for every 183 feet of 
ascent. As soon as the temperature falls below dew point and conden- 
sation begins, cooling is retarded or stopped. Descending air is always 
warmed by compression one degree for every 183 feet of descent; hence 
condensation seldom occurs in descending air. 

2. Radiation. — If the air stands or passes over or near cooler objects, 
as the ground, the sea, snow, ice, or a mass of cooler air, it radiates its 
heat, its temperature falls, and condensation may occur. This usually 
takes place when winds blow from warmer to cooler regions. 

3. Conduction. — Air in contact with a cooler body loses heat by con- 
duction. This process is less important than is commonly supposed, be- 
cause air is a poor conductor of heat and only that portion which actually 
touches a cooler body is cooled in this way. Dew and frost are generally 
deposited from air in contact with a cold surface. 

4. Mixture. — When warm air is mixed with cool air, the temperature of 
the mixture may fall below the dew point and condensation may take place. 




Fig. 173.— Fog seen from mountain top above it, California. (U. S. Weather Bureau.) 



Clouds. — When water vapor is condensed in the air, it be- 
comes visible as fog or cloud, which is composed of minute 
particles of liquid water or ice, a sort of water dust. Fog is 



196 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 




Copyright, 1906, by F. M. Locke. 

Fig. 174. — Upper part of cumulus clouds. 




Fig. 175. — Stratus clouds. 



formed at or near the surface of land or water, cloud at higher 
altitudes. Clouds usually settle slowly and, on reaching a 
layer of warmer or drier air, evaporate. If condensation con- 
tinues they are renewed above as fast as they evaporate below. 



MOISTURE IN THE AIR 197 

Cumulus clouds are rounded masses which look white in sunlight and 
dark in shadow. They begin to form at the level where a rising column 
of air reaches the dew point, and may be piled up to a height of five miles 
or more. They are common in equatorial regions and on calm summer 
afternoons, when the air which starts upward in the morning has reached 
a sufficient height. They often bring showers and thunderstorms and 
hence are sometimes called " thunder heads." 




Fig. 176. — Cirrus clouds. 

Cirrus clouds are light, feathery clouds formed at great heights, where 
the vapor condenses into minute crystals of snow or ice. 

Stratus clouds lie in low, horizontal bands, or continuous sheets. 

Nimbus or storm clouds are stratus clouds from which rain or snow 
falls when the sky is overcast. 

There are many forms and varieties of cloud intermediate between 
cumulus, cirrus, and stratus, of which a dozen or more are common and 
have compound names, such as strato-cumulus, cirro-cumulus, and cirro- 
stratus. 

Precipitation. — When clouds become sufficiently dense the air 
is no longer able to buoy up or evaporate them, and the water 
falls as rain, or, if the temperature of the cloud is below freezing, 
as snow or hail. Snowflakes are formed by the direct conden- 
sation of vapor into six-angled crystals of many symmetrical 



108 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

torms, which are usually tangled together before reaching the 
earth. Hailstones are rounded masses of snow and ice which 
have passed through several layers of alternating warmer and 
colder air. 

Precipitation is measured by the rain gauge. Any open vessel with 
vertical sides will serve the purpose. The amount of rainfall or precipi- 
tation is measured in inches of depth of water caught, snow being first 
melted. In middle latitudes one inch of rain a day is a large fall, but 
sometimes an inch falls in an hour. In tropical regions a rainfall of 40 
inches has been recorded in a single day. One inch of rain amounts to 
113 tons of water on one acre of surface. 

Dew and Frost. — Dew and frost are produced by the con- 
densation of vapor upon any cold surface. The deposit is 
heavier during clear, still nights and upon surfaces which radiate 
heat freely. On still nights the cooler air settles into valleys 
and depressions and produces heavier dew or frost there than on 
elevations. A slight cover, as a tree, or even a piece of paper, 
may prevent cooling to the dew or frost point. 

The dates of the last killing frost in the spring and the first in the fall 
are very important as limiting the growing season for crops. In central 
United States the date of the first frost in the fall may vary as much as 
a month in different years, and its occurrence a month earlier than usual 
may result in millions of dollars' damage to the corn crop. A temperature 
near freezing may be destructive to fruits which are in blossom or approach- 
ing maturity, and even trees and vines themselves may be killed. Orchards 
and fields are sometimes protected by a covering of light cloth, like a tent, 
by ditches or pipes containing hot water, by fires, or by filling the air with 
smoke which acts as a blanket. The presence of a body of water, even a 
small pond, may be sufficient to prevent unseasonable warm spells in the 
spring and early frosts in autumn. For this reason the shores of lakes 
Ontario, Erie, and Michigan ' and the Finger Lakes of New York are 
bordered by belts of vineyards, peaches, and small fruits. 

Storms. — Outside the tropics a large part of the rainfall is 
brought by storms, or temporary disturbances which travel 
through the atmosphere along definite paths. They bring to 
the regions over which they pass shifting winds and usually 
cloudiness and precipitation. If no precipitation occurs they 



MOISTURE IN THE AIR 199 

are catted wind storms. The winds may be gentle or extremely 
violent, as in the hurricane and tornado. In nearly all storms 
the movement of air is spirally inward, toward and around a 
center of low pressure, and they may be described as traveling 
cyclones. They may be of any size from a summer dust whirl 
a few feet in diameter, to a storm which covers half a continent. 
The whirls travel in the direction of the general air current, but, 
like eddies in a river, continually take in new air in front as they 
leave other air behind. 

Weather Bureaus and Maps. — Benjamin Franklin was prob- 
ably the first man to observe that, while long rain storms were 
brought to New England by winds from the east, they began 
earlier at points farther west. To account for these facts he 
conceived the idea of a large whirling storm which passed across 
the country from west to east. Within the last fifty years the 
Weather Bureaus of the United States, Canada, and European 
countries have learned that in the northern belt of prevailing 
westerly winds there is a continual procession of cyclones moving 
eastward around the earth. By following their progress from 
day to day, a Weather Bureau is able to predict their arrival 
and the kind of weather they will bring. 

In America and Europe hundreds of observing stations have been es- 
tablished, from which telegraphic reports are sent to a central station at 
a given hour twice a day. From these reports weather maps are made, 
showing the temperature, pressure, wind direction, state of the sky, and 
precipitation at that hour for the whole country. By means of these maps 
forecasts are made of what the weather is likely to be for the next 24 or 
48 hours. It is sometimes possible to forecast the weather for a week 
or ten days. The intervals between the cyclones are occupied by areas of 
relatively high pressure, or anticyclones. As the procession of cyclones 
and anticyclones passes across the country it brings corresponding changes 
of weather, a knowledge of which is of the greatest importance to farmers, 
sailors, boatmen, shippers, and all people whose business or pleasure depends 
in any degree upon the weather. Figs. 177-180 show typical examples of 
cyclones and anticyclones, but their study should be continued by the 
use of the daily weather maps issued by the nearest Weather Bureau 
station. 



MOISTURE IN THE AIR 201 

Cyclones. — The cyclone shown in Fig. 178 (January 29) is a 
mass of warm, damp air, and therefore of low pressure, which 
covers a rounded area more than 1 ,000 miles in diameter. The 
pressure is lowest at the center, near Chicago, and increases in 
every direction toward the circumference. The whole mass is 
moving in a spiral whirl inward and counterclockwise. In the 
southern quarter the winds are from the southwest and south, 
in the eastern quarter from the southeast and east, in the 
northern quarter from the northeast and north, and in the 
western quarter from the northwest and west. The southerly 
and easterly winds bring to the southeast side temperatures above 
freezing, while on the northwest side northerly winds bring tem- 
peratures mostly below freezing. As the air approaches the 
center it rises and escapes upward. As it rises and whirls it 
expands and air from all sides is mixed together. By expansion 
and mixture the warm, damp air from the Gulf and Atlantic is 
cooled, and its vapor condenses into a layer of cloud which covers 
nearly the whole area of the cyclone. Snow or rain has been 
general in the cyclonic area during the past twenty-four hours 
and is still falling over half of it. The cyclone is moving east- 
ward and carrying with it warm, cloudy, and stormy weather, 
which clears up as the storm passes. 

Anticyclones. — The anticyclone shown in Fig. 180 (January 
31) is a mass of cold, dry air, and therefore of high pressure, 
which covers an area measuring about 1,200 miles east and west 
and a much greater distance north and south. The pressure is 
highest, 30.6 inches, at the center from Lake Superior to Texas, 
and diminishes toward the circumference. It may be compared 
to a long, smooth ridge upon which heavy rain is falling and the 
water draining off down the slopes. In like manner the air 
settles downward and spreads out from the center. 

Water would run down the slopes of the hill by the steepest and most 
direct path, but the rotation of the earth causes the air to move slantingly 
down the slope of pressure along lines to the right-hand of the shortest 
path to the bottom. The north-south elongation of the anticyclone causes 
the principal slopes to be toward the east and west, and accordingly at 




203 



204 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

most places in the eastern half the winds are from the northwest and north, 
and in the western half from the southeast. The northerly winds bring 
clear, cold weather which extends from Port Arthur, where the thermom- 
eter stands at 20 below zero, to New Orleans, where the temperature 
is below freezing. On the west side the temperature rises, and it is as 
warm in northern Montana as in Florida. The anticyclone brings into 
the midst of the country dry, clear air, which is cold on account of free 
radiation, and the temperature changes more rapidly along east-west than 
along north-south lines. It will move eastward and carry its clear, cold 
weather to the Atlantic coast. The progress of low temperatures eastward 
in front of an advancing anticyclone is called a cold wave. 

Procession of Lows and Highs. — Figs. 177-180 show a regular 
procession of cyclones and anticyclones moving eastward during 
four days. 

On January 28 a cyclone, or " low," is passing from New England over 
the Atlantic Ocean. A long ridge of moderately high pressure extends 
from the upper lakes to Florida, with north and northwest winds and gen- 
erally clear sky. On the west it descends to a large oval area of low pres- 
sure, with spirally inflowing air, general cloudiness, and a patch of rain east 
of the center. The Pacific states are covered by a feeble anticyclone, or 
" high." 

On January 29 the same elements appear with changed positions, areas, 
and intensities. The principal center of low pressure has moved from 
Kansas to Illinois, and the winds, have increased in velocity. The force of 
the winds is indicated by the closeness of the isobars. The barometer at the 
center has fallen to 29 inches. The air is crowding rapidly in from all sides 
and streaming upward. It whirls as it rises, and warm, damp air from the 
Gulf and Atlantic is mixed with cold air from the interior of the continent. 
Damp air is cooled by expansion and mixture, and condensation takes place, 
resulting in cloudiness almost everywhere, rain in the southeast quarter, 
and snow in the north and west. The southerly winds have raised the 
temperatures in the southeastern states 10 to 20 degrees above those of 
the previous day. The high on the Pacific coast has expanded and de- 
veloped until it covers the western half of the country, the pressure at its 
center in Wyoming being 30.9 inches. The slope to the east is steep, and 
high northwest winds carry freezing temperatures to New Mexico. The 
central and southern states are dotted with cold-wave warnings, which 
mean that the temperature will fall 20 to 40 degrees in the next twenty-four 
hours. 



206 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

On January 30 the principal low center has moved to the southern 
coast of New England. Across the middle of the country a ridge of very 
high pressure extends north and south, with steep and regular slopes to the 
ocean on both sides. Another low is coming in from the Pacific. The 
winds have a high velocity almost everywhere. In the east they are in 
accordance with the slopes, but in the west they are more irregular on 
account of the influence of the mountains. A large area of snowfall ex- 
tends from Wisconsin to Maine and as far south as Virginia. Over the 
west of the country clear, cold weather prevails, with temperatures from 
— 30 at Winnipeg to below freezing in the Gulf and southern border 
states. The highest temperatures are in Florida and along the Pacific 
coast. The cold-wave warnings have been shifted to the Atlantic coast. 

On January 3 1 the storm center has disappeared over the Gulf of St. Law- 
rence, and the ridge of high pressure has moved a few hundred miles east- 
ward. The cold wave has reached the extremity of Florida, and nearly 
the whole country is left with clear, cold, dry, pure, and invigorating air. 
The rain, snow, and high winds have washed dust from the air and from 
houses, and the cold air under high pressure has crowded foul gases out of 
every crack and cranny. At the same time, the low temperatures and 
blinding snowstorms in the northern states bring more or less hardship 
and danger to man and beast, and sometimes blockade railroads for many 
days. Freezing temperatures in the southern states may do vast damage 
to fruit orchards. On the whole the benefit is probably much greater than 
the loss or injury. The procession of lows and highs renders the weather 
very variable, bringing a change from relatively cool, clear, and dry to 
relatively warm, cloudy, and rainy weather, or the reverse, two or three 
times a week. 

Weather Forecasts and Warnings. — The United States Weather 
Bureau issues forecasts of the weather every morning, which are published 
in the principal newspapers and posted at post offices throughout the 
country. Responsible persons who promise to post the forecasts in a 
public place may receive them on request free of charge; some news- 
papers publish also the weather map. They constitute the most trust- 
worthy predictions of the weather that can be made, because they are based 
upon actual knowledge of the atmospheric conditions which prevail over 
the continent and surrounding oceans. The forecasts are made for large 
areas and cannot prove correct in every detail at every locality. The 
eastward movement of lows and highs is sometimes slower and sometimes 
faster than usual. Rarely a storm center moves backward to the west for 
a short distance. Occasionally an area of low pressure divides or dies out 
or a new one is rapidly formed, and such events cannot be foreseen. 



MOISTURE IN THE AIR 



207 



Storm warnings are displayed at all sea and lake ports for the guidance 
of mariners and shippers, and thus great loss of life and property is pre- 
vented. Notice of the advance of a cold wave is given 12 to 36 hours 
before it arrives, and in consequence millions of dollars' worth of property 
is protected and saved. Frost and flood warnings are issued whenever 
occasion requires for the benefit of fruit growers, river men, and owners of 
property along streams. 

Hurricanes. — In tropical and temperate latitudes cyclonic 
storms occur of such violence as to be among the most destructive 
of natural agencies. Some of them are so small as to permit 
their whirling motion to be generally recognized, and are called 
"cyclones" in popular speech. In late summer and autumn the 
West Indies are visited by destructive hurricanes which arrive 
from the southeast. They begin in the equatorial calms and 
increase in size until they reach a diameter of 100 to 300 miles 
(Fig. 181). On the land they destroy almost everything, — 
forests, crops, buildings, and people. On the sea they are very 
dangerous to shipping and pile up the water until it sweeps 
over the coast lands, flooding fields and towns. 




Fig. 181. — Path of the Galveston hurricane. 



Fig. 182. — Paths of West Indian 
hurricanes. 



When they approach the coast of the United States they usually turn to 
the northeast and die away in the north Atlantic Ocean (Fig. 182). Occa- 
sionally a hurricane turns westward near Florida and passes over the land, as 
did the one which destroyed the city of Galveston, Texas, in September, 1900 
(Fig. 181). Similar storms occur in the Pacific Ocean near the Philippine 



208 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



nil iRHsmai^w^' 



Islands, and in the Indian Ocean both north and south of the equator. 
In those regions they are called typhoons. 

Tornadoes. — The tornado or "cyclone" of the western and 
southern states is even more violent than the hurricane, but 

fortunately much smaller. It ap- 
pears as a whirling, funnel-shaped 
cloud, the small end of which 
sweeps the ground and overturns 
or carries away everything in a 
path from a few rods to a half 
mile in width. The wind some- 
times reaches a velocity of 200 
miles an hour and nothing mova- 
ble can resist it. Although many 
stories of its power are appar- 
ently incredible, it is difficult to 
exaggerate the truth. Trees of 
all sizes are uprooted or twisted 
off, buildings are demolished and 
their fragments scattered over the 
neighborhood. Boulders, masses 
of iron, and even railroad engines, 
are lifted from their places. Ani- 
mals and human beings are whirled 
about and carried long distances, 
often being torn in pieces or killed 
by collision with other objects. 
Wires and straws driven into hard wood testify even more 
strongly to the incredible violence of the wind. 




Fig 



183. — Progress of a tornado, New- 
castle, Neb., April 30, 1898. 



The tornado travels about 40 miles an hour and seldom lasts more tha: 
two hours. The average number in the United States is about 150 a year. 
They are most frequent in Kansas, Iowa, Missouri, Illinois, and Georgia, 
but may occur anywhere east of the meridian of ioo° and south of the 
parallel of 45 . In some states people dig holes in the ground, called 
" cyclone cellars," into which they may retreat for safety on the approach 
of a tornado. 






MOISTURE IN THE AIR 



20Q 




Fig. 184. — Effects of a tornado, Illinois. 



Thunderstorms. — Thunderstorms are seldom cyclonic, but 
result from the rapid rising of currents of warm air until heavy 
cumulus clouds are formed at the top. They bring violent 
gusts and squalls of wind and a downpour of rain, which leave 
the air cool, clear, and bracing. In the United States a thunder- 
storm moves eastward at the rate of 20 to 50 miles an hour, and 
grows larger as it progresses. It may attain a length, from side 
to side, of 100 miles, and a breadth, from front to rear, of 30 miles, 
and continue from 2 to 12 hours. 

Rainfall. — There is probably no spot on the face of the earth 
where it never rains or snows. The mean annual rainfall, as 
far as measured, varies from less than one inch to more than 
400 inches. Less than 10 inches in any region means a desert 
or tundra. At least 20 inches are generally necessary for forests 
and for agriculture without irrigation. The lands most favor- 
able for human occupation have from 20 to 60 or 80 inches (Fig. 
185), while 100 inches or more may be counted as undesirable 
excess. 

Even a small amount of rain falling during the growing season is of 
more value for grass and crops than a large amount falling in the autumn 
and winter. A good crop of corn has been raised in Kansas with a rainfall 
of only eight inches for the year, but most of it fell in spring and early 



MEAN AW 

Afh 




|H More than 60 in 

:30toG0in. 



MNFALL 




Less than 10 in. 



212 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

summer. Winter rains supply ground water, fill wells, springs, and streams ; 
and saturate the subsoil from which trees draw most of their water supply. 
On a map showing regions of small (less than 20 inches), medium (20 to 60 
inches) and large (more than 60 inches) rainfall (Fig. 185) several general 
laws of rainfall appear. ■ 

Laws of Rainfall. — 1 . Disregarding small patches, the prin- 
cipal rainfall regions extend north and south, cutting across the 
temperature zones. This is due to the fact that the large land 
masses extend north and south across the path of the prevailing 
winds. 

2. The coasts of the continents receive more rain than the interior, 
and windward coasts receive more than leeward. Most of the 
rainfall is first evaporated from the oceans, carried as vapor by 
the winds, and condensed as it is cooled by rising over the lands. 

3. Highlands act as screens which stop most of the moisture 
on the windward side and cut it off from the regions on the lee- 
ward side, producing a rain shadow, just as opaque bodies cut 
off light and cast dark shadows. 

4. In the equatorial zone as a whole, the rainfall is much heavier 
than in higher latitudes. This is the result of two causes. Air 
at a temperature of 70 can contain and carry nearly twice 
as much vapor as air at 50 , and more than four times as much 
as air at 30 (see table, p.. 194). Warm, damp air is lighter 
than cool, dry air, and is compelled to rise by the pressure of 
heavier air around it, and by rising the vapor is cooled and con- 
densed. Somewhere between the tropics, swinging north and 
south with the changing position of the sun in the heavens, is the 
heat equator (Figs. 159, 160), or line passing through the point of 
highest temperature on each meridian. The heat equator car- 
ries with it a belt of calms and rising air, in which copious rain 
falls in the afternoon and evening every day. This belt of daily 
rains crosses the geographical equator twice a year, and touches 
the northern tropic in July and the southern in January. Thus 
the regions of heavy rainfall stretch across the lands from tropic 
to tropic, and have one or two rainy seasons, each of which 
lasts a month or more. During the rest of the year the trade 



MOISTURE IN THE AIR 213 

winds blow, bringing more or less rain from the ocean to east 
coasts and slopes and unprotected lands of the interior (Figs. 186, 
187). Where the trade winds blow from large land masses or 
over highlands they bring a dry season, or in some cases a 
desert is the result. In monsoon regions, like southeastern Asia 
from India to japan, the winds bring rain from the ocean in 
summer and dry weather from the land in winter (Figs. 186, 187). 

5. The subtropical zones, as a whole, receive less rainfall than 
any other part of the land, outside the polar regions, and may be 
called the desert belts. This is due in part to the high pressure 
which exists there, especially in winter. The general move- 
ment of the air is downward and outward to the north and 
south. Descending air is warmed by compression and hence 
cannot bring rain. In north Africa and southwestern Asia, 
the winds blow from Eurasia and are dry. Here the Sahara, 
Arabian, and Persian deserts stretch from the Atlantic to India, 
covering an area larger than the whole of Europe. In south- 
western United States and northern Mexico, desert conditions 
are intensified and extended by mountain ranges which shut out 
the moisture from the Pacific and Gulf of Mexico. In South 
America the deserts of Peru and Chile are rendered almost rain- 
less by the lofty chain of the Andes on the east. The Kalahari 
desert in southwest Africa and the desert of central Australia 
lie in the rain shadow of the highlands on the east. 

6. In the temperate zones the prevailing winds from the west 
bring copious rains to the west coasts of North America, Europe, 
southern South America, and New Zealand. In central Europe 
the rains extend halfway across the continent, but in northern 
Europe and North and South America they are stopped by 
mountain ranges near the coast. 

7. The eastern half of North America, from the Gulf to Hudson 
Bay, is saved from being a desert by the cyclonic winds which bring 
vain from the Gulf and Atlantic. The interior of North America 
is dry because the high mountains shut out rain from the west, 
and the cyclonic winds from the southeast lose most of their 




214 



2l6 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

moisture before they reach so far inland. Central Eurasia is 
dry because it is too far from the Atlantic, and the monsoon 
rains from the Indian and Pacific are shut out by lofty moun- 
tains, which inclose the deserts of Tibet, Gobi, and the Ural- 
Caspian basin. 

8. The polar caps have little rainfall because the air is too cold 
to carry much vapor. 

About half of all the land receives too little rainfall to sup- 
port more than a scanty population. Only about one third of 
the land receives between 20 and 60 inches of rain, the amount 
most favorable for thriving, civilized communities. 

The maps of seasonal rainfall, Figs. 186, 187, show that very 
few places in the world receive heavy rainfall in winter. 






CHAPTER XV 
CLIMATE 

Factors of Climate. — Climate includes all those conditions of 
the atmosphere which affect plant and animal life, among which 
temperature and moisture are the prime factors. The presence 
of dust and disease germs affects the healthfulness of the air and 
forms a factor of climate. The climate of any region is deter- 
mined by its latitude, relief, prevailing winds, and position in 
relation to the great features of land and sea, and is thus a 
resultant and expression of all the physical influences and con- 
ditions which exist there. It is mainly climate which, in turn, 
controls, directly or indirectly, the life of plants, animals, and 
men. Therefore climate may be regarded as the middle link 
in the chain of geographical causes and consequences. It fur- 
nishes the key to a full understanding of geographical conditions. 

The Equatorial or Tropical Zone. — In equatorial lowlands 
the temperature is constantly high with small range, and the 
rainfall is generally heavy. As the belt of calms, with low 
pressure and ascending air, follows the vertical rays of the sun 
northward and southward, it brings a rainy season in spring 
and fall near the equator and in summer near the tropics. Near 
the tropic the two rainy seasons may overlap, and on high- 
lands exposed to trade winds from the ocean the rainfall is well 
distributed throughout the year. 

Equatorial regions where all seasons are sufficiently wet are occupied by 
dense evergreen forests (Figs. 192, 193). In regions where, on account of 
elevation or protection by highlands, the rainfall is moderate or there is a 
strongly marked dry season, the forests thin out or disappear and give 
place to savannas covered with coarse grass and scattered trees (Fig. 200). 
In the monsoon region of southeastern Asia there is a hot summer with 
heavy rainfall, and a cool, dry winter. The monsoon forests are almost as 
luxuriant as the equatorial, but are nearly leafless in winter. 

217 



2l8 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

The Subtropical Zones. — In the subtropical zones of high 
pressure and descending air, and extending into the temperate 
zones, vast tracts of arid lands occupy about half the land surface 
of the globe. On account of the dryness and clearness of the 
air, arid regions are subject to extremes of temperature, the 
deserts of Africa, Arabia, North America, and Australia being 
the hottest regions of the world. The daily range is sometimes 
from above ioo° in the daytime to near freezing at night. 

In the deserts vegetation, is confined to scattered thorny bushes which 
are often leafless (Figs. 191, 192, 204, 205). The deserts are bordered by 
savannas or steppes, where a thin growth of bunch grass furnishes pasturage 
(Figs. 192, 201, 202, 203). The soil needs only water to make it productive, 
and wherever sufficient ground water exists oases of dense vegetation arise 
(Fig. 206). 

Mediterranean Climates. — Some regions in or near the belt of 
tropical calms have a climate which is transitional between that 
of the subtropical zone and that of the temperate zone. The 
rainfall is generally small, but not so little as to produce desert 
conditions. The summers are too dry to be favorable for grass, 
and pasturage is relatively poor. Frost rarely occurs, and the 
range of temperature is small. The climate is characterized 
by uniformly mild, dry weather, free from sudden or great 
changes. The skies are generally clear, and warm days alternate 
with cool nights. 

In these regions people can live most of the time out of doors, and the 
climate is probably the most agreeable and healthful in the world. Hence 
they are noted as health and pleasure resorts. These conditions prevail in 
most of the coast lands and islands of the Mediterranean Sea, and con- 
stitute what is often called the Mediterranean climate. 

Conditions similar to those of the Mediterranean region prevail in Cali- 
fornia, central Chile, south Africa, and southwest Australia (Fig. 188). 

The Temperate Zones. — The so-called temperate zone in 
the northern hemisphere is broken up by the land masses and 
mountains into regions which have diversified and even strongly 
contrasted climates. Nearly all parts of North America and Asia 
between 30 and 50 N. Lat. are characterized by hot summers 



CLIMATE 219 

and cold winters, less than half the year being really temperate. 
The interiors of North America and Eurasia have an extreme 
continental climate of great range of temperature and small 
rainfall, which, in areas screened by mountains, is so intensified 
as to produce bleak steppes and deserts almost as barren as the 
Sahara (Fig. 192). The mid-continental ranges of temperature 
are carried by the prevailing westerly winds over the east coast 
lands of North America and Asia, but cyclonic winds from the 
Gulf of Mexico and Atlantic and the summer monsoons from 
the Pacific bring a moderate rainfall (Figs. 185, 186). 

East Coast Climates. — Those parts of the United States and 
southern Canada lying east of the meridian of ioo° have a con- 
tinental climate with four strongly marked seasons and a large 
range of temperature (Figs. 161, 164). On the Gulf coast these 
conditions are modified by nearness to the ocean and the tropic. 
Throughout the region the climate is made changeable by the 
frequency of cyclones and anticyclones, especially in winter, when 
alternations of cold, clear weather, and mild, cloudy weather with 
rain or snow, occur every three or four days. 

Northwest winds, blowing out from an advancing center of high pres- 
sure, bring a cold wave with zero temperatures as far south as St. Louis and 
Philadelphia, and freezing temperatures in Florida. Southerly winds blow- 
ing toward a center of low pressure carry cloud and rain, changing to snow 
in the north, across the country to and beyond the Great Lakes (Figs. 177- 
180). These irregular changes are very noaceable in spring, when alter- 
nations of almost summer weather with wintry spells occur from March 
to May. In summer the cyclonic changes are much feebler and less fre- 
quent. In autumn the change of seasons is more gradual than in spring, 
and clear, mild days and frosty nights may persist without notable storms 
until December. 

Almost everywhere east of the meridian of ioo° the annual 
rainfall is above 20 inches, increasing from northwest to southeast 
to above 50 inches on the Gulf coast. It is well distributed 
throughout the year, with a maximum in spring and early sum- 
mer when crops are growing. Midsummer and early autumn 
are usually dry and favorable for harvest (Figs. 185, 186, 187). 



220 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

Most of this region was originally covered with a heavy forest of decidu- 
ous trees, green in summer and bare in winter. Toward the north and on 
the Appalachian highlands the forests are partly or wholly of evergreen 
coniferous trees (Fig. 192). Towards the west the forests pass gradually 
into prairies, or tracts on which grasses form a dense, continuous sod or turf, 
trees being absent except along the streams. 

In Asia the countries which most nearly resemble eastern United States 
in climate and products are Manchuria, Korea, northern China, and Japan. 

West Coast Climates. — The west coast lands of North 
America and Europe are exposed to the westerly winds from 
the ocean and have a truly temperate, oceanic climate, almost 
as equable as that of the equatorial zone. The narrow strip 
of country between the mountains and the Pacific in Alaska, 
British Columbia, Washington, and Oregon has a mild, moist 
climate, with heavy precipitation in winter (Figs. 185-187). In 
the north the summers also are rainy and the snowfall is sufficient 
to maintain large glaciers upon all the mountains. The strip is 
covered with dense forests of pine, fir, spruce, cedar, and redwood, 
which yield a greater value of timber to the square mile than any 
other in the world (Fig. 192). 

The countries of western Europe belong to the same climatic 
belt as the Pacific states of America. They are exposed to the 
westerly winds blowing from the north Atlantic, the waters of 
which are abnormally warm for their latitude on account of 
the drift of the Gulf Stream from tropical regions. The winds 
themselves are the chief cause of the ocean drift, and are there- 
fore both directly and indirectly the cause of the mild climate. 
Their influence is greatest on the west coast and diminishes 
gradually inland, but south of Norway there are no mountains 
to shut out moisture from the interior. 

In winter the winds are stronger and more southwesterly in direction, and 
the isotherms extend almost north and south, the temperature decreasing 
from west to east (Figs. 160, 171, 172). The range of temperature is small, 
and the rainfall large, with excess in autumn and winter. The air is con- 
stantly damp, and rain falls on more than half the days in the year. In 
autumn and winter fog and drizzling rain prevail. The winds from the 
ocean and the cloudiness combine to. prevent great or sudden changes of 



CLTMATE 221 

temperature. Cyclones and anticyclones pass across these countries from 
west to east, but bring much smaller contrasts of weather than in eastern 
America. Spells of freezing weather are not prolonged or severe, and 
occasional falls of snow on the lowlands do not remain long upon the 
ground. Hardy plants blossom out of doors all winter, and work in the 
fields can be carried on every month in the year. The frequent rains are 
very favorable for grass, which covers unplowed ground with a thick sod 
even among the trees of the forest. The country looks fresh and green at 
all seasons. The Mediterranean countries have a climate like that of Cali- 
fornia, the British Isles like that of Oregon and Washington, and Norway 
resembles British Columbia and southern Alaska. The small range of tem- 
perature and large rainfall, with excess in autumn and winter, change gradu- 
ally eastward to continental conditions of large range and small rainfall, with 
excess in summer. In general the climate of central Europe resembles that 
of eastern United States, with the direction of east-west change reversed. A 
person traveling from France to central Russia would notice the same kind 
of changes as in traveling from Maryland to Colorado. A traveler from 
southern France to Sweden would experience changes similar to those from 
Florida to Quebec. The natural vegetation and cultivated crops of Europe 
have about the same range as in the United States, with local variations. 

Climate and Civilization. — The middle latitudes of North 
America, Europe, and eastern Asia are the homes of the most 
advanced and progressive peoples of the world. The climate 
is not oppressive and overpowering as in the equatorial and 
polar regions. The contrast of seasons is stimulating to human 
effort, which must be expended in the summer to provide food 
and shelter for the winter, while the winter brings a period of 
comparative leisure and rest. The energy received from the sun 
can be utilized to greater advantage than elsewhere to supply 
human wants. Conditions of climate and vegetation are more 
capable of human control than in the regions of perpetual heat 
or perpetual cold, and human intelligence and labor bring a 
greater return of wealth than anywhere else in the world. 

In the southern hemisphere the only lands which resemble the United 
States and Europe in climate and products are Chile, Argentina, Uruguay, 
eastern Australia, and New Zealand. Their natural resources and future 
possibilities are great, but for the most part they lack development for the 
want of sufficient population. 



222 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

Cold Temperate Zones. — The northern cold temperate zone 
extends across North America and Eurasia. The climate is that 
of continental lands in high latitudes. The winter tempera- 
tures are the lowest in the world, except in Antarctica ; the sum- 
mers are cool and the range of temperature is very large (Figs. 
159, 160, 161). The long days of summer, during which the 
period of sunshine varies from 16 to 24 hours, compensate for 
the low altitude of the sun above the horizon, and days with 
temperatures above 70 occur. The growing season is short, but 
may be warm enough to ripen wheat even on the Arctic circle. 
The rainfall is generally less than 20 inches (Fig. 185), but is 
more efficient than an equal amount in lower latitudes because 
evaporation is less. During more than half the year the ground 
is covered with snow, which plays an important part in protect- 
ing the roots of trees from severe frost. 

A belt of coniferous forest extends across the continents from ocean to 
ocean, interrupted by patches of " muskeg " swamp and prairie (Figs. 192, 
197, 199). 

In the southern cold temperate zone, the narrow extremity of South 
America presents two strongly contrasted regions. The west coast re- 
sembles southern Alaska in small range of temperature, heavy rainfall, and 
dense coniferous forest. In Tierra del Fuego the climate is stormy and 
inclement at all seasons, and snow falls every month in the year. East of 
the mountains the rainfall is too scanty for forests, and Patagonia is an 
arid steppe (Fig. 185). 

The Polar Caps. — In the north polar regions the climate is 
still more severe than in the cold temperate zones. The winters 
are not colder but longer, and the cool growing season is reduced 
to two months or less. During the winter the sun does not rise 
at all for a period of from one day to six months. The sky is 
generally clear, but violent storms of wind are frequent. There 
is no spring, but winter holds with slight mitigation until June, 
when the ice begins to break up and summer comes on with 
a rush. The summers are cold and foggy, and in September 
winter sets in again with full severity. The annual precipita- 
tion is less than 10 inches, but there is so little melting that on 



CLIMATE 223 

moderate elevations snow arid ice accumulate from year to year. 
The ground is permanently frozen to great depths and never 
thaws for more than a few feet on top. 

The Arctic borderlands of America and Eurasia are occupied by timdras 
(Figs. 192, 208), where the only vegetation consists of lichens, mosses, 
grasses, and stunted shrubs, which never grow higher than the level of the 
snow surface in winter. 

Greenland and Antarctica are buried under vast sheets of ice, upon which 
no living thing exists. Bare land appears around the shores, where sea- 
birds, mammals, and in the north a few thousand Eskimos find means of 
support. 

Alpine Climate. — The climate of lofty mountains and plateaus 
resembles that of the polar caps. Between the tropics, surfaces 
above about 15,000 feet in elevation are covered with permanent 
snow and ice. In middle latitudes perpetual snow descends to 
about 10,000 feet, and in polar regions nearly to sea level. The 
height of the snow line varies not only with the temperature 
but with the amount of snowfall, and is different on the wind- 
ward and leeward sides, and on north and south slopes, of the 
same range. The rainfall generally increases with the altitude 
to a height which varies on different mountains and then dimin- 
ishes. The belt of heaviest rainfall below the snow line is gen- 
erally forested (Fig. 198). 

Tropical plateaus between 5,000 and 13,000 feet in elevation 
are generally more healthful and suitable for human occupation 
than the lowlands. In the northern Andes and Mexico nearly 
all the cities and areas of dense-population are found upon the 
highlands. In Mexico the traveler can ascend in a distance 
of 100 miles from the hot, damp coast land to a temperate 
plateau and cold mountain heights, through as many belts of 
climate as he would traverse in traveling from the tropic to the 
polar circle. 

Climatic Regions. — The map, Fig. 188, shows how the land areas may 
be divided into regions bounded approximately by isotherms and lines of 
equal rainfall, in each of which the principal factors of climate are nearly 
uniform. These are grouped under twelve types, and all the regions be- 




324 



CLIMATE 225 

longing to the same type, wherever they occur, have essentially the same 
climate. This map should be compared with the maps of temperature 
belts and of annual and seasonal rainfall (Figs. 164, 185, 186, 187). The 
following table explains the map and briefly characterizes each type. 

1. Equatorial and Tropical. — All seasons hot and range small. 
Amazon Type. — Equatorial. Rainfall above 60 inches. No 

dry season. Am. 1 -Am. 3. 

Caribbean Type. — Tropical. Rainfall generally 20 to 60 
inches (except in 5). Dry winter. Car. i-Car. 5. 

2. Subtropical and Warm Temperate. — Always temperate or 
with a hot season. 

Arizonan Type. — Always dry. Rainfall generally less than 
10 inches. Ar. i-Ar. 5. 

Calif ornian Type. — Dry summer. Rainfall generally 20 to 60 
inches. Cal. i-Cal. 5. 

Mexican Type. — Dry winter. Rainfall generally less than 60 
inches. Mex. i-Mex. 4. 

Floridan Type. — No dry season. Rainfall less than 80 inches. 
Fl. 1-FI.5. 

3. Temperate and Intemperate. — Temperate, with a cold 
season, or with a cold and a hot season. 

Oregon Type. — Oceanic. Small range. Rainfall generally 
20 to 60 inches. Or. i-Or. 3. 

Mississippian Type. ■■ — Continental. Large range. Rainfall 20 
to 60 inches. Miss. 1 -Miss. 4. 

Interior Type. — Continental. Large range. Rainfall less 
than 20 inches. Int. i-Int. 3. 

4. Cold Temperate. — Cold with a temperate season. 
Alaskan Type. — Oceanic. Small range. Rainfall in some 

parts above 60 inches. Al. i-Al. 3. 

Canadian Type. — Continental. Large range. Rainfall mostly 
less than 20 inches. Can. i-Can. 2. 

5. Polar and Alpine. — Always cold. 

Polar Type. — Rainfall generally less than 10 inches. Pol. 1 - 
Pol. 4. 



CHAPTER XVI 
PLANT REGIONS 

The Distribution of Plants. — The distribution of plants over 
the face of the earth and the kind of vegetation found in any 
region are nicely adjusted to a combination of conditions, of 
which air, light, water, soil, and temperature are the most im- 
portant. Green plants absorb about 75 per cent of their weight 
from the air in the form of oxygen and carbon dioxide. The 




Fig. 189. — Zonal arrangement of plants. 

absorption of carbon dioxide is done by the leaves and other 
green parts in the sunlight and cannot take place in the dark. 
Plants absorb from the soil through their roots large quantities 
of water containing compounds of nitrogen, potash, phosphorus, 

226 



PLANT REGIONS 



227 



lime, and other elements in solution. Most of the water, after 
circulating through the plant, evaporates from the leaves. For 
all plants there is a certain range of temperature within which 
they are able to survive, and a smaller range within which they 
grow vigorously. Hence plants are arranged in zones, roughly 
corresponding to the zones of temperature. Within the zones 
of temperature the distribution of plant societies is determined 
largely by the available soil water. Thus the variations of soil 
water break up the plant zones into plant regions, just as the 
rainfall breaks up the temperature zones into climatic regions. 
The natural vegetation of any region is a striking and intel- 
ligible expression of the physical conditions of structure, relief, 
and climate which prevail there, and, consequently, of the natu- 
ral influences exerted upon animal and human activities. Vege- 
tation is a key which unlocks the chain of geographic causes 
and consequences. 

Water Plants. — A large class of plants flourish only in water or in 
very wet soil. (1) Floating or submerged plants are characterized by thin 
walls through which water is 
absorbed by all parts of the 
plant. Roots, being unneces- 
sary, are absent or used for 
anchorage only. The plant is 
supported by the water, and 
has no need of stiffness; hence 
it is soft and flexible. Nu- 
merous species of seaweed be- 
long to this class, some of 
which attain such dimensions 
as to rival the largest of land 
plants. Bladderworts and 
duckweeds are common float- 
ing plants in fresh-water lakes 
and ponds. (2) Many plants 
are rooted to the soil, but Fig. 190. -Water plants, 

have submerged or floating 

leaves ; for example, pondweeds and water lilies. The submerged leaves are 
commonly narrow and threadlike; the floating ones very broad (Fig. 190). 




228 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



(3) Swamp or marsh plants are rooted in water or very wet soil, while 
their stems and, leaves are exposed to the air. Many societies of them 
are common in temperate climates; among them may be found cat-tail 
flags, reed grass, sedges, willows, alders, tamarack, and cypress. 

Drouth Plants are adapted 
to thrive in a dry soil and 
climate. They generally have 
an extensive root system in 
proportion to the size of the 
plant, a small leaf surface, 
and a thickened epidermis. 
Many plants survive regular 
periods of drouth by the dis- 
appearance of root, stem, and 
leaves, and the reduction of 
the individual plant to seeds, 
bulbs, or tubers. The shed- 
ding of leaves is a provision 
against destruction by the dry 
as well as the cold season. 
The reduction of the leaves to 
threads or needles, as in the 
pine and other species of co- 
niferous trees, and the total 
absence of leaves, as in the 
cactus, are efficient means of 
withstanding drouth. The perfection of these adaptations is probably 
found in the melon cactus, in which the whole plant is reduced to a spiny, 
thick-skinned, globular mass. 

Intermediate Plants. — The class of plants adapted to a medium sup- 
ply of water comprises about 80 per cent of all known forms and consti- 
tutes the more common vegetation of temperate regions. 

Salt Plants. — Some species of plants are able to grow where the soil 
water is impregnated with common salt or alkali, which would be fatal to 
most plants. Salt plants are found along the seashore, in tidal marshes, 
around salt lakes, and in arid regions. 

Plant Regions. — The land surface may be divided according 

to its vegetative covering into woodland, grassland, and desert. 

1 . Woodland. — Trees are deep-rooted and their growth is 

not dependent on frequent rain or a rainy growing season, but 




Fig. 191. — Drouth plants. Barrel cactus, Mexico. 
(Desert Botanical Lab.) . 






PLANT REGIONS 229 

on the presence of water within reach of the deep roots. They 
require a warm growing season, a moist subsoil, and calm, damp 
air in winter. They may thrive where long seasons of drouth 
recur periodically. They are not limited by low temperature 
in winter, if protected by a snow covering, but suffer from dry 
winds when the ground water is frozen. 

2. Grassland. — Grasses are shallow-rooted and their growth 
is dependent upon a moist superficial soil. They require fre- 
quent, even if small, rainfall during the growing season. They 
endure extreme drouth during the season of rest. 

3. Desert. — Deserts are due to dryness of the ground or low 
temperature. Except on ice caps, vegetation is not absent but 
sparse. There is always much vacant space, and the plants do 
not struggle against one another for room, but against unfavorable 
conditions of soil and climate. Fig. 192 shows the distribution 
of the principal types of vegetation. It should be compared 
with the map of climatic regions (Fig. 188). 

Wet Woodland. — Tropical Rain Forest. — In the climatic 
regions of the Amazon type, where the temperature is constantly 
high and the rainfall above 60 inches, the growth of vegetation 
is luxuriant. Dense forests of very tall trees, overgrown with 
climbing plants and air plants, and crowded with underbrush, 
occupy the country and almost shut out large animals and men. 
The trees have large, thin leaves with smooth, glossy skin to 
shed water, and are green all the year round. The number of 
species growing together is very large, but palms and tree ferns 
are characteristic. This woodland can hardly be penetrated 
except by way of the streams, and is more difficult to cross thaD 
a desert. 

If men, with great labor, make a little clearing in it to plant crops, the 
native vegetation springs up again so rankly that the work of clearing 
must be done over again every year. The heavy rainfall leaches and 
washes away the soil, which is soon exhausted. The hot, damp air is un- 
healthful and oppressive, and the scattered inhabitants, overcome by the 
forces of nature, are unable to rise above a state of savagery. These con- 
ditions prevail in a large part of the Amazon basin, in west equatorial 




23° 



PLANT REGIONS 



231 



Africa, and in the East Indies. European peoples have made some prog- 
ress in establishing colonies in all these regions, and have stimulated the 
natives to gather and grow valuable tropical products, such as rubber, 
sugar, coffee, spices, chocolate, tapioca, tobacco, fruits, oils, and medicines. 



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Fig. 193. — Tropical rain forest, Java. (Schimper, Plant-Geography.) 



Monsoon Forests. — In some parts of the monsoon region of 
southeastern Asia the rainfall is more than 60 inches, but occurs 
mostly in summer, while the winters are relatively cool and dry. 
In the rainy season the forests are much like the tropical rain 
forest, but in the dry season are leafless. 

Temperate Rain Forest. — In the climatic regions of the 
Floridan type the conditions are similar to those of the tropical 
rain forest, except that the temperatures are not so high and the 
rainfall is not so heavy. They are occupied by a mixed forest 
of evergreen and deciduous trees. Climbing and air plants, 
ferns, and tree ferns are abundant. The multiplicity of species 
is very great. The camphor tree of Formosa, the eucalyptus of 
Australia, and the palmetto and live oak of Florida are charac- 
teristic. These forests are much less formidable than the tropi- 



232 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



cal rain forests. They have been largely cleared and the lands 
now support a moderate or dense population of civilized people. 
The principal crops are rice, corn, wheat, sugar cane, cotton, 
semi-tropical fruits, and, in China, tea. 




Fig. 194. —Temperate rain forest, Florida. (Schimper, Plant-Geography.) 



Temperate Summer Forest. — The climatic regions of the 
Oregon and Mississippian types are very favorable to the growth 
of trees which have broad, soft, thin leaves in summer and are 
bare in winter. The oak, beech, maple, elm, chestnut, ash, 
linden, and sycamore are characteristic and widely distributed. 
Climbing plants and air plants are rare, but grasses and herba- 
ceous plants growing among the trees are relatively abundant. 

These forests furnish the world's supply of hardwood timber for fuel 
and construction. In the United States and Europe they have been largely 
destroyed to clear the land for agriculture. The combination of forest 
and grassland, natural or artificial, affords good conditions for agriculture 



PLANT REGIONS 



233 



and stock raising, and makes these regions preeminent in the production 
of foodstuffs and the homes of the richest and most progressive peoples. 









----- at f 




,_<tg«fflS 



Fig. 195. — Temperate summer forest, North Carolina. (U.S.G.SJ 



Dry Woodland. — Tropical Dry Forest. — In the climatic re- 
gions of the Californian type and some of the Mexican type trees 
grow in clumps rather than in forests. The leaves are ever- 
green, small and thick, with a leathery skin. The myrtle, holly, 
laurel, box, cork oak, oleander, cypress, and olive are character- 
istic species. Lilies, tulips, hyacinths, and other herbaceous 
plants growing from bulbs and tubers are numerous. Grass is 
scanty and poor, and sheep and goats are kept in preference 
to cattle. In the Mediterranean region olive oil largely takes 
the place of meat and butter. Grapes and tropical fruits 
flourish, while grain is grown in the cool, moist season or by 
means of irrigation. 

The plateau of the Dekkan (Mex. 4, Fig. 188) is protected by bordering 
heights from the excessive monsoon rains. Two or more crops a year are 
often raised, some suitable to the hot, wet season (June to October), and 



234 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



others to the cool, dry season (November to March). Thus the same area 

may produce large crops of wheat, rice, and cotton. The monsoon rains are 

so variable from year to year 
that the crops often fail, and 
on account of the dense pop- 
ulation a dry year may bring 
a serious famine in which 
thousands starve to death. 
Irrigation is practiced, and 
India is dotted with storage 
tanks and wells. About 50,000 
miles of canals carry off flood 
waters, and in the dry season 
distribute water to the fields. 
Extreme forms of tropical 
dry forest are thorn forest and 
thorn scrub, in which all woody 
plants are dwarfed, scraggy, 
thorny, and tangled, forming 
thickets difficult to penetrate 
(Fig. 196). The dwarf oak, 
acacia, and mesquite are char- 
acteristic. Thorn forests occur 
in scattered patches in the 
borderlands around deserts 

and grasslands. It is called chapparal in North America, catinga in Brazil, 

and scrub in Australia (Fig. 203). 

Temperate Dry Forest {Coniferous) . — Climatic regions of the 
Alaskan and Canadian types are generally occupied by ever- 
green coniferous forests. Most of the species have a central 
trunk, with horizontal or pendent branches in whorls, and their 
fruit is a cone. The needle-shaped or scale-shaped leaves, 
with a hard skin, are adapted to dry and frozen soils and strong 
winds. The pine, fir, spruce, cedar, and larch extend through- 
out the cold temperate belts and on mountain sides in all lati- 
tudes, and furnish the world's supply of soft-wood timber. 

The valuable products are timber, as yet largely unavailable for want of 
means of transportation, and the furs of numerous small animals, such as 




Fig. 196. — Tropical dry forest, Mexico. 









i 1 


•4 -'JI18H1 






■ & 4 


SL jfti. 1 


3Kt,: -jKiyS?* 














iM 


I sHl 






' 














"■-V- 


' v - *' 


_ .._ _. - _~. "^.-^ 



Fig. 197. — Coniferous forest, Great Bear Lake, Canada. (U.S. Biol. Surv.) 




Fig. 198. — Spruce forest, Colorado. 
235 



236 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



the fox, sable, marten, mink, otter, badger, beaver, and muskrat. Canada 
and Siberia have been for centuries the chief sources of furs, and there is 

no indication that the supply 
is diminishing. The popula- 
tion is generally very sparse. 
Coniferous forests sometimes 
occur on poor, porous soils, 
in wet, warm regions, as the 
long-leaved pine of the south- 
ern United States 

Grassland. — Savanna. 
— In climatic regions of 
the Caribbean type, the 
vegetation consists chiefly 
of tall, stiff grasses grow- 
ing in dense tufts. Low, 
deciduous trees with par- 
asol-shaped tops are scat- 
tered about and give the 
landscape a parklike as- 
pect (Fig. 200). A large 
part of central Africa is 
occupied by such savan- 
nas, the home of immense 
numbers of large ani- 
mals, — the elephant, rhi- 
noceros, hippopotamus, 
giraffe, lion, leopard, buf- 
falo, zebra, and nearly 
It is the finest country in 




Fig. 199. — Cedar forest, Oregon. (U.S.G.S.) 



one hundred species of antelopes 
the world for " big game." 

The abundance of animal life has been a serious hindrance to human 
occupation and control, but is itself an evidence of what might be done 
there with domestic animals. The success of native agriculture, carried on 
with rude implements and methods, in raising corn, bananas, millet, beans, 
sheep, goats, and cattle, suggests great possibilities for the future. Under 
the control of Europeans the black natives are prevented from robbing and 



PLANT REGIONS 



237 



killing one another, and are settling down into peaceful and orderly in- 
dustrial communities. The natural conditions are favorable for their 
redemption from primeval savagery and for the occupation of the country 
by civilized peoples. 









Fig. 200. — Savanna with fringing forest, East Africa. (De Martonne.) 

A part of Brazil is a plateau with moderate rainfall, and the 
forests are replaced by campos, or undulating grassy tracts, 
with clumps of trees in the valleys. In Venezuela the rain 
shadow of the Guiana highlands produces the llanos, which 
have a warm, rainless winter of five months, during which all 
vegetation apparently dies. When the summer rains appear 
grass and herbaceous plants spring up and grow luxuriantly. 
In swampy depressions and along streams oases of stunted trees 
rise like islands from the sea. 

Prairie. — In the drier parts of climatic regions of the Mis- 
sissippian type, forests give place to prairies, or open tracts of 
meadow, covered with a thick, continuous sod of grasses and 
other herbaceous plants. Fringing forests of small trees along 
the streams do not occupy more than 20 per cent of the 
area. The soil is especially fertile and easily worked. Such 
lands he all ready for human occupancy, and are at once avail- 
able with small expenditure of labor. The American prairies 
are one of the most productive agricultural regions in the world. 

Steppe. — Climatic regions of the Interior type, and other 



2 3 8 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



temperate regions with a rain- 
fall between 10 and 20 inches, 
are covered with bunch grass, 
which does not form a con- 
tinuous sod or grow very 
high. It cures on the ground 
into a nutritious hay. Trees 
are very rare. Vast areas of 
this kind exist in the interior 
of Eurasia, where they are 
called steppes. They have 
been for many centuries the 
home of nomad peoples, who 
have no fixed habitation, but 
wander about with flocks and 
herds of cattle, horses, camels, 
sheep, and goats in search of 
pasture. The similar regions 
of North America have been ranged over by herds of cattle 
under the care of "cowboys," but are now being divided up 
and fenced into cattle and sheep ranches. By irrigation and 




Fig. 201. — Bunch grass. (U.S.G.S.) 




Fig. 202. —Steppe, South Dakota. (U.S.G.S.) 



PLANT REGIONS 



239 



dry farming agriculture is gradually encroaching upon the areas 
of pasture. 

The pampas of Argentina 
include prairie and steppe 
lands, hitherto used for rais- 
ing sheep and cattle for wool 
and hides. As railroads are 
extended they are being con- 
verted into wheat fields. The 
veldt of the Transvaal, in 
South Africa, is a similar re- 
gion, where cattle raising is 
combined with some agricul- 
ture (Fig. 203). The Austra- 
lian bush between the desert 
and the eastern mountains, 
belongs to the same class, and 
supports millions of sheep 
and cattle. Steppe lands 

are " belts of herbage strown between the desert and the sown," and will 
always be important sources of meat, wool, and hides. 




Fig. 203. — Steppe and thorn scrub, South Africa. 




Fig. 204. — Sage brush desert, Arizona. 



Deserts. — In desert regions the rainfall is generally less than 
10 inches, but desert conditions 'may occur where the rainfall 
is much larger if rapid evaporation or subterranean drainage 



240 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



leaves the soil and subsoil too dry. Great deserts occur in cli- 
matic regions of the Arizonan, Interior, and Polar types. 

Warm Deserts. — In tropical and temperate deserts vegeta- 
tion is limited to drouth and salt plants only. The root system 

is large and shallow, and the 
leaf surface is greatly re- 
duced. There are few leaves 
at once, and in many forms 
no leaves at all, their func- 
tions being performed by the 
stems. Desert plants re- 
spond quickly 'to a slight fall 
of rain, and pass through 
their stages of leaf, flower, 
and fruit rapidly. They are 
characterized by thick skin, 
hairs, spines, resins, and 
spongy tissue for storing 
water. The cactus, agave, 
sage brush, and creosote bush 
are typical forms. Where 
sufficient ground water ex- 
ists, permanently or tempo- 
rarily, oases occur and sup- 
port a sparse population. 
The air of the desert is 
pure- and stimulating, and 
acts directly, along with the 
hard conditions of life, to render animals and men lean, hardy, 
restless, and fierce. 

Polar and Alpine Deserts. — Along the polar borders of con- 
iferous forests and above the timber line on mountains, the 
growing season is short and plant growth is very rapid. Patches 
of herbaceous plants have rosettes of leaves next to the ground 
and send up short stems bearing bright-colored flowers. Trees, 




Fig. 205. — Giant cactus, Arizona. 



PLANT REGIONS 



241 




Fig. 206. — Date palm oasis, Sahara. Note flat-roofed houses. (Robin.) 

when present, are stunted, scraggy, and twisted. Shrubs spread 
out close to the ground in dense mats. 

Tundras. — In high latitudes and altitudes the ground is per- 
petually frozen, thawing only to the depth of a few inches in 




Fig. 207. —Alpine desert. Bolivia. (Schimper.) 



242 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



summer. The principal vegetation consists of lichens and mosses, 
upon which caribou, reindeer, musk oxen, and hares find sub- 
sistence. Willows, larches, and junipers occur in the form of 




Fig. 208. — Tundra, Lapland. (Schimper.) 

dense cushions, which do not rise above the level of the snow 
surface of winter. 

Ice Deserts. — Ice caps are entirely devoid of vegetation, ex- 
cept the occasional appearance of microscopic algae known as 
" red snow." 

In cold deserts the possibilities of human life are reduced to the lowest 
limits. In Europe the Laplanders maintain a semicivilized life by keeping 
herds of reindeer. In Asia the Chukchis, and in America the Eskimos, 
depend largely upon the sea, in which fish, birds, seals, and walrus abound. 



CHAPTER XVII 

THE GEOGRAPHY OF ANIMALS 

Water Breathers and Air Breathers. — The most important 
distinction among animals due to adaptation to geographical 
environment is that between those which absorb oxygen from 
solution in water and soon die out of water, and those which 
absorb oxygen from the air and soon die when immersed in 
water. The conditions of life in the water are more simple 
and less varied than in the air. The water furnishes nearly 
uniform pressure on all sides of the body, and little energy is 
expended in supporting weight; hence the form and surface of 
the body, the structure of the skeleton and muscular system, 
and the character and arrangement of the limbs are adapted to 
propulsion through the medium. A comparison of a fish and a 
cat will show a remarkable contrast in these particulars. The 
water breathers include all fish, most shellfish, such as oysters 
and clams, most crustaceans, such as crabs and lobsters, and a 
vast number of lower and less familiar forms of animal life. 
The temperature of water is uniform over wide areas, and far 
less changeable than that of the air. Food supply is more gen- 
erally diffused in water than on land, and many aquatic animals 
are fixed to one spot and have their food brought to them by 
currents. Hence the water breathers belong entirely to the less 
highly developed classes. The demands upon them are compara- 
tively few and simple, and their lives do not require the numerous 
and complex activities and abilities of life in the air. 

Marine animals depend directly or indirectly for food upon 
the vegetation which flourishes in the sea or the organic mat- 
ter brought by rivers from the land. Life in the sea is most 



244 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

abundant in the shallow waters of the continental shelf (p. 24), 
which are penetrated by the heat and light of* the sun, and 
where the bottom is covered with mud from the land. The 
open sea is inhabited near the surface by great schools of fish 
and swarms of invertebrate animals, many of which are minute 
in size. The abundance of mineral matter in solution, the vol- 
ume of sunlight, and the uniformity of temperature are favor- 
able to the growth of microscopic plants in such numbers as to 
furnish an ample food supply for all. 

The sea is probably rather densely inhabited at all depths, but those 
animals which live constantly below a few hundred feet are difficult to 
catch, and our knowledge of them is imperfect. Deep-sea animals exist 




Fig. 209. — Deep-sea fish, with lanterns. 

under conditions of great pressure, low and unchanging temperature, and 
absolute darkness. Most of them are degenerate descendants of surface 
and shallow water forms. Some are eyeless and some are provided with 
lantern organs which generate a dim light. Owing to the great area and 
depth of inhabited waters, the number of marine animals probably exceeds 
all others. 

Some animals are amphibious, spending a part of their lives in water 
and a part in the air. Many insects are hatched and pass their larval 
stage in water, but live their adult life in air. Tadpoles have gills and are 
true water breathers, but change into frogs, toads, or salamanders, which 
are air breathers. A few animals have both gills and lungs throughout life 
and can live in either medium. Among the higher animals some assume 
the aquatic form and habit, but are not water breathers. Among birds the 



THE GEOGRAPHY OF ANIMALS 



245 




Fig. 210. — Marine mammals. 

penguins swim vigorously under water 
in pursuit of fish. Even some mam- 
mals, which suckle their young and 
cannot live more than a few minutes 
under water, have assumed the 
aquatic form and habit. Such are the 
whale, dolphin, porpoise, sea cow, 
seal, and walrus. The last two are 
ice-riding animals, vigorous swimmers 
which spend a part of the time on the 
polar ice. 

Fliers and Walkers. — An- 
other distinction among animals, 
scarcely less important geo- 
graphically, is the division of 




Fig. 211. — Penguins. Wings are used for 
swimming. (Shackieton's The Heart of 
the Antarctic.) 



246 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

air breathers into fliers and walkers or crawlers. Most birds and 
insects and a few mammals have become highly specialized for 
locomotion in the air. The buoyancy and resistance of the air 
are slight compared with water, and flying requires a more com- 
plex body structure than swimming. The insect body is small 
and very light, with a thin outer shell, provided with one or 
two pairs of delicate wings. The muscles inside the shell are 
capable of moving the wings at a high speed, amounting in the 
house fly to 330 strokes a second. The bones of the bird are 
hollow and filled with air for lightness, the fore limbs are pro- 
vided with a complex arrangement of interlocking and folding 
feather vanes, the breast bone and muscles are strongly de- 
veloped for moving the wings, and the tail feathers act as a 

rudder. 

Among the more power- 
ful birds, flight has at- 
tained the climax of natural 
locomotion. The passen- 
ger pigeon can fly 100 miles 
an hour, the eagle and con- 
dor can rise to great heights 
and soar almost without 
effort, while the albatross 
and frigate bird make jour- 
„■•'.."".. neys of thousands of miles 

Fig. 212. — Soaring bird. J 

across the sea. Yet no an- 
imal can live in the air indefinitely without alighting on land or water for 
rest and food. 

Animal Adaptations. — The adaptations of animals to food 
supply, climate, enemies, and breeding are innumerable. A few 
of the more striking cases may be noticed. 

Most insects are vegetable eaters and live upon the juices and 
leaves of plants. Many eat dead animal matter or are parasitic 
on live animals. 

The large majority of birds live on seeds, fruits, and insects. 
Sea birds are fish eaters, and birds of prey catch land animals 
alive. A few are scavengers of carrion. 




THE GEOGRAPHY OF ANIMALS 



247 




Mammals, with few exceptions, are land animals and walk, 

run, or jump. A few species swim (p. 245). Bats are the only 

mammals that really fly. 

Most mammals are plant 

eaters (herbivorous) or 

flesh eaters (carnivorous) , 

but bears, swine, and men 

eat all kinds of food. 

Plant eaters have cutting 

teeth for cropping herb- 
age, and flat grinders for 

chewing it. The large 

ones are hoofed animals, 

including cattle, sheep, 

goats, deer, antelopes, the 

giraffe, camel, horse, hog, 

hippopotamus, rhinoceros, 

and elephant. The small 

plant eaters are gnawers 

(rodents), such as the squirrel, prairie dog, beaver, rat, mouse, 

guinea pig, and rabbit. The flesh eaters live mostly upon the 

plant eaters and generally have 
claws and sharp teeth for catching, 
holding, and tearing their prey. 
The large ones are bold and fierce, 
with keen senses and quick intelli- 
gence, as shown by the cat, lion, 
tiger, leopard, panther, dog, fox, 
wolf, bear, otter, and weasel. The 
small ones live chiefly upon insects, 
as the mole and the bat. The plant 

eaters in a wild state are in constant danger of attack from the 

flesh eaters, and few of them have adequate means of defense. 

Their safety lies in flight or concealment; hence the majority 

have keen senses and are slender, agile, and built for speed. 



Fig. 213. — Plant eater: caribou. 




Fig. 214. — Flesh eater: lion. 



248 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 




Fig. 215. — Hippopotamus. Lives mostly in water 
with only eyes and nostrils above the surface. 



A few are able to maintain themselves by strength, mass, and 
tough skin, as the bison, rhinoceros, hippopotamus, and elephant. 

The rodents are in danger 
from birds as well as beasts of 
prey, and find refuge by bur- 
rowing in the ground, in hol- 
low trees, or about buildings. 

Many animals of all classes 
are favored by protective colora- 
tion which makes them almost 
invisible in their usual haunts. 
Cases of this kind are most nu- 
merous among insects and birds, 
but the lion on the sand, the leopard, zebra, and giraffe in the forest, and 
the Arctic fox, hare, and ptarmigan on the snow, are striking examples. 

Shelter. — -The higher animals generally make use of some kind 
of a shelter, nest, or house, at least for the purpose of rest and 
rearing their young. Aquatic animals are generally homeless, but 
fur seals swim hundreds of miles to reach the islands where they 
annually congregate to bring forth their cubs. On land, animals 
burrow in the ground and make use of natural rock houses or 
dens. Beasts of prey find shelter and a sleeping place in some 
thicket. The hippopotamus spends the day in the water, with 
only his nostrils visible. The large plant eaters are generally 
homeless and their young are " precocious," or able to run 
with their mothers soon after birth. Constructive ability 
reaches a high development among birds, whose nests are often 
marvels of skill in the choice of site and in the adaptation of 
materials to home building. Yet the palm for such achieve- 
ment must be given not to any bird, but to the beaver and the 
bee. The beaver gnaws down trees, builds an elaborate dam 
with timber and mud, raises his house of reeds above the sur- 
face of the pond, and enters it through a tunnel opening under 
water. Bees construct in a hollow tree a comb made of their 
own wax, in a form which gives a maximum of storage space 
with a minimum of material, and fill it with honey and pollen. 



THE GEOGRAPHY OF ANIMALS 249 

It is notable, however, that such feats are accomplished only by 
an organized community which rivals human society. 

Distribution of Animals. — Animals are so much more mobile 
than plants that they have become more widely diffused, and 
the earth cannot be divided into animal regions so clearly dis- 
tinguished as the plant regions. It may be said that every 
species of animal would be found in every part of the earth 
suitable for its maintenance, if it were not prevented by bar- 
riers of some sort which its individuals are unable to cross. 
The principal barriers to animal migration are water, climate, 
mountains, deserts, forests, lack of food supply, and enemies. 
Marine animals are generally limited to salt water, but some sea 
fish run up rivers to spawn and feed. The barriers in the sea are 
differences of temperature, pressure, and food supply. Shallow- 
water forms never venture far into the open sea because of lack 
of food. Deep-sea forms die when brought to the surface be- 
cause of reduction of pressure. Those which swarm in warm 
surface waters would perish in waters a few degrees colder. 

On land the most widely distributed animals are birds, bats, 
and some insects on account of their powers of flight. Those of 
smallest range are found among fresh-water fishes, which can- 
not cross from one stream system to another and are stopped 
by high falls, and snails, which are very poor travelers. For 
most land animals except fliers the sea is an absolute barrier 
to migration, and each land mass would have a fauna in most 
respects unlike every other if there had never been any land 
connection with some other mass. Mountain ranges are bar- 
riers more on account of climate and limited food supply than 
height and steepness. If they were not cold and barren most 
animals would be able to climb and cross them. Deserts are 
nearly as efficient barriers as the sea because they are almost 
equally foodless. Grazing animals cannot cross a wide belt of 
dense forest because of want of grass, and forest animals do 
not flourish in grassland. Although warm-blooded animals have 
the power to maintain their bodily temperature above that of 



250 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



the surrounding air and are generally protected by a coat of 
hair, wool, feathers, or fat, these things are not sufficient to 
enable them to live in all climates. Domestic cattle would soon 

perish in Greenland, where 
the musk ox seems not to 
suffer at temperatures of 
eighty degrees below zero. 
Polar bears brought to tem- 
perate regions must be con- 
stantly supplied with ice. 

Animal Realms. — The Northern 

Realm. — The northern continents 

are close together, and in the past 

have been so connected as to give 

a continuous land area from Nor- 

Fig. 216. — Musk ox. way eastward around to Labrador. 

The bulk of these continents lies in temperate regions between the tropic 

and the polar circle, and there is no impassable north-south mountain bar- 





Fig. 217. — Animal realms and regions. 



rier. Consequently the fauna throughout this vast area presents a striking 
similarity, with a multitude of minor differences. It is especially the home 
of the hoofed grass eaters, — cattle, deer, sheep, goats, horses, and camels. 
While beasts of prey are not absent, the species are relatively few in num- 



THE GEOGRAPHY OF ANIMALS 



251 



ber and inferior in size. These natural conditions have been intensified by 
man, who has killed the flesh eaters and bred the grass eaters. North 
Africa has recently been connected by land bridges with Europe, and be- 
longs to the Northern realm, which 
finds its southern land boundaries 
along the tropic in the natural 
barriers of the Mexican plateau, 
the Sahara and Arabian deserts, 
and the great mountain ranges of 
southern Asia. 

The Indo- African Realm lies be- 
tween the tropics and includes 
Africa south of the Sahara, Asia 
south of the Himalayas, and most 
of the islands of the East Indies. 
It is far richer in number and vari- 
ety of species than the Northern 
realm. The plant eaters are well 
represented by wild cattle, asses, and horses in Asia and by antelopes 
and zebras in Africa; but the flesh eaters are even more conspicuous, 




Fig. 218. — Zebra. 




Fig. 219. — Chimpanzee. 



Fig. 220. — Giraffes. 



252 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



including the lion, tiger, leopard, and panther, the largest and most fero- 
cious of their class. It is the home of the largest land animals, — the 
rhinoceros, hippopotamus, and ele- 
phant, — and of the tallest, — the 
giraffe. It is well supplied with 
four-handed folk, containing all the 
manlike apes, the gorilla, chimpan- 
zee, and orang, and all the tailless 
monkeys, besides baboons, gibbons, 
and lemurs. Among its birds are 
eagles, vultures, ostriches, guinea 
fowls, peafowls, pheasants, and the 
jungle cock. Crocodiles and venom- 
ous serpents abound. More than 
half its mammals and birds do not 
occur elsewhere. In number, vari- 
ety, and beauty of butterflies and 
beetles it is unrivaled. Central 
Africa is now the richest region in 




Fig. 221. — Ostriches. 



the world for big game, but white men will soon exterminate many of 

the species unless they are protected by law. 

The South American Realm is 
almost wholly tropical and includes 
the most extensive and luxuriant 
forests in the world. Large ani- 
mals of the higher classes are sin- 
gularly few. Notwithstanding the 
existence of the pampas, llanos, 
and campos (pp. 237, 239), which 
are vast seas of grass, the hoofed 
grass eaters are poorly represented 
by a few deer, the llama and three 
other small species of the camel 
family, the peccary, and the tapir. 
Horses, cattle, and sheep have been 
introduced from Europe. The 
beasts of prey are the puma, pan- 
ther, and jaguar, the latter a match 
for the lion. Among animals pecul- 
Fig. 222.— Llama. iar to this realm are the little arma- 




THE GEOGRAPHY OF ANIMALS 



253 



dillos, the sluggish sloths, the toothless anteaters, and the long-tailed mon- 
keys. Yet it is surpassingly rich in the lower forms of life, and is the paradise 
of naturalists. In birds, reptiles, 
fishes, and insects it is the most pop- 
ulous part of the world. Five sixths 
of the birds do not occur elsewhere. 
There are 400 species of humming 
birds. Among its serpents are the 
anaconda and boa constrictor, the 
largest of their kind; and turtles, 
crocodiles, and alligators abound. 





Fig. 223. — Tapir. Fig. 224. — Monkey. 

Most of the animals in the world would 
thrive in South America if they could get 
there. 

The Australian Realm, including Australia, 
New Zealand, New Guinea, and some small 
islands, presents the poorest and strangest 
assemblage of animals in the world. Most 
of its mammals belong to the small and 
unique group which carry their young in an 
abdominal pouch formed by a fold of skin. 
The largest is the kangaroo, as tall as a 
man, and making prodigious leaps with its 
powerful hind legs and tail. These and sev- 
eral species of large and almost wingless 
birds, the emus and cassowaries, are the 
most prominent of the native inhabitants. Fig. 225. — Emu. 




254 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 




Fig. 226. — Kangaroo. 



Flesh eaters are represented only by dogs. These lands have been long 
separated from the other continents by deep water, which has kept out all 
the larger and higher forms, including beasts and birds of prey. They are 
a sort of museum in which weak and inferior species, long ago destroyed in 
other lands, have been protected from enemies and preserved. The thor- 
oughness of this protection is shown by the fact that rabbits introduced 
from Europe have so multiplied in the absence of enemies as to become a 
serious pest. 

Islands are poor in species of both animals and plants in proportion to 
their distance from the continents. Mammals are often entirely wanting. 
Birds and insects, which can fly, and reptiles, whose eggs are not killed by 
salt water, are more numerous. 






CHAPTER XVIII 

THE HUMAN SPECIES 

Man as an Animal. — Compared with the animals which are 
physically best equipped for the struggle for existence, man is 
in most respects inferior. He cannot fly, is a slow and awkward 
swimmer, and is easily outstripped in running. For defense he 
has no horns, or hoofs, or beak, or claws, and his teeth are 
small. His skin is soft, thin, and almost naked. The young 
require parental care for many years. 
His structure indicates descent from 
ancestors of apelike habits, living in 
trees, and on fruits. The physical 
characters which render him superior 
to all other animals pertain chiefly to 
the feet, hands, and skull. The feet 
and limbs are used for locomotion 
only, and he can stand and walk erect. 
The hands and arms are highly per- 
fected and left free for use solely as 
organs for grasping, holding, and per- 
forming delicate and complex move- 
ments. The cranium has more than 
twice the capacity of that of any ape. 
Its bones do not unite for twenty years 
or more, thus enabling the brain to at- 
tain a weight in proportion to the total Fi s- 227.— Hand and foot of the 

1 -i • 1 . , .1 , r , chimpanzee and of man. 

body weight superior to that 01 most 

other intelligent animals. The long period of growth, and the 
size and complexity of the brain, render possible a development 
of the mental powers which sets the human species apart from 

255 




256 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

all the other inhabitants of the earth, and almost immeasurably 
superior to them. With few exceptions, man is the only species 
in which the individuals cooperate in a complex way for the 
benefit of the community. It is by living in societies that man 
has become educated and civilized. " Man has not made so- 
ciety, but society has made man." All those things which are 
the result of human thought constitute a realm by itself, which 
may be called the mind sphere {psycho sphere). 

Enemies. — Man's worst enemies are no longer beasts of 
prey and venomous serpents, although these are still formidable 
in Africa and India, but the minute organisms which infect his 
body with disease. Many tribes of American Indians have been 
exterminated by smallpox and measles. To-day parts of cen- 
tral Africa are being depopulated by sleeping sickness. The 
plague is carrying off the people of India by the hundred thou- 
sand. Asiatic cholera and yellow fever, bred in the tropics, 
have repeatedly carried death into temperate countries. Ma- 
larial fever renders many parts of the equatorial regions almost 
uninhabitable by white men. Yet no one of these diseases 
is more destructive than the " white plague " of tuberculosis, 
which causes as many deaths in the United States every year as 
did the whole Civil War. All these diseases and many more 
are caused by microscopic plants or animals which multiply in 
the blood, and have been unrecognized until recently. Medical 
and sanitary science has discovered means of defense against 
many of these enemies, and may be expected to conquer all of 
them in time. 

Varieties and Races. — Of all species of animals, man is the 
most widely distributed. His intelligence enables him to live 
in all lands and all climates between Greenland and Tierra del 
Fuego, and from marshes and islands near sea level to the high 
Andes and Himalayas. From his cradle land, which was prob- 
ably in southern Asia, he seems to have migrated in all direc- 
tions, without definite purpose or destination, wherever the land 
connections of those remote times furnished a road. Led on by 



THE HUMAN SPECIES 



257 



the pursuit of food, or driven from place to place by enemies, 
he penetrated every unoccupied land, and while still in a very 
rude stage of culture took pos- 
session of most of the hab- 
itable world. In the struggle 
for existence under such a 
great variety of conditions, 
men, like other animals, nec- 
essarily developed differently 
and unequally. Hence arose 
four distinct races, differing 
in physical and mental char- 
acteristics. The hot, moist 
equatorial forests of central 
Africa produced a black race 
(Ethiopian) , which spread over 
tropical Africa and the whole 
of Australia, which formed a new center, where men of a some- 
what different and lower type were developed. The high, arid 




Fig. 228. — Ethiopian race. 





Fig. 229. — Mongolian race. 



Fig. 230. — American race. 



plateaus of central Asia produced a yellow race (Mongolian) , which 
spread over nearly the whole of Asia and the neighboring islands. 
The American continent produced a red race (American) , perhaps 



2 5 8 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



originally a branch of the yellow, which occupied its whole area 
for many centuries without interference from the rest of the 
world. North Africa and western Europe gave birth to a white 




Fig. 231. — Distribution of races previous to modern migrations. 

race (Caucasian) , which, in historic times, has spread thence over 
northern and southern Asia, America, south Africa, and Australia, 
dispossessing or gaining control of the aboriginal races. Fig. 
231 shows the distribution of the four races as it was previous 

to the modern migra- 
tions which began in the 
sixteenth century. The 
table on page 259 shows 
their distinctive charac- 
teristics and present dis- 
tribution. 

Types of the Caucasian 
Race. — The peoples of 
each race, though alike in 
the characteristics men- 
tioned on page 259, differ 
in many minor details. Among the peoples of the Caucasian 
race there are three well-marked types, Baltic, Alpine and 
Mediterranean: 




Fig. 232. — Long skull and broad skull. 



THE HUMAN SPECIES 



259 






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260 



PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 



i. Baltic. — Blond or florid, with flaxen or reddish glossy hair, 
blue eyes, long skull, and tall stature. Scandinavians, North 

Germans, Dutch, English, 
Scotch, Irish, and their de- 
scendants in America, Austra- 
lia, and south Africa; West 
Persians, Afghans, many Hin- 
dus, and some other peoples 
of southwest Asia. 




Fig- 233. — Baltic type. Darwin. 





Fig. 234. — Alpine type. Pasteur. 

2. Alpine. — Light brown or 
swarthy, with brown, wavy dull 
hair, brown, gray, or black 
eyes, broad skull, and medium 
stature. Most French and 
Welsh, South Germans, Swiss, 
Russians, Poles, Bohemians, 
and other peoples of south- 
eastern Europe ; Armenians, 
East Persians, and the peoples of the eastern Pacific islands. 
3. Mediterranean, — Olive brown to almost black, with dark 



Fig. 235. — Mediterranean type. — A Sicilian. 



262 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY 

or black wiry hair, dark or black eyes, long skull, and small 
stature. Spanish and Portuguese and their descendants in 
America; some French, Welsh, and Irish; Italians and Greeks; 
Berbers, Egyptians, and other peoples of north Africa; Arabs, 
Syrians, and other peoples of southwest Asia; some Hindus. 

Population of the World. — The population of the world has 
increased 250 per cent in the last century, and now exceeds 
1,600 millions. Of these about 51 per cent are Caucasian, 36 
per cent Mongolian, n per cent Ethiopian, and 1 or 2 per cent 
American. 

The map, Fig. 236, shows that the large groups of dense population 
are all in the northern continents and mostly between the tropic and the 
polar circle. About 75 per cent of the world's population live between the 
annual isotherms of 40 and 70 ; this is not wholly due to the direct in- 
fluence of temperature, but largely to the difficulty of maintaining human 
life in the midst of luxuriant tropical vegetation. The most habitable parts 
of the world he between the tropical forests and deserts and the cold tem- 
perate coniferous forests. More than 70 per cent of the world's population 
live in regions having a rainfall between 20 and 60 inches. 

" Man is a deep-sea inhabitant of an ocean of air," and 
thrives best where there is the greatest depth of atmosphere 
above him. In 1880, 93 per cent of the people of the United 
States lived at elevations of less than 1,500 feet above the sea, 
and it is- probable that the proportion is not very different 
for the whole world to-day. The possibilities of population in 
any region depend primarily upon the number of people that 
can be fed. Therefore the highest densities may be looked for 
in warm lowlands without excessive rainfall, and in cooler and 
drier lands which can import a part of their food supply from 
abroad. In such cases accessibility from the sea is an impor- 
tant factor. The former conditions are exemplified in south- 
eastern Asia, where half the people of the world five almost 
entirely on their own products, and the latter conditions in 
western Europe, where one fifth of the world's population live 
largely by buying food from America, eastern Europe, and Asia. 



PART II. ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY 



CHAPTER XIX 

NATURAL RESOURCES AND FOOD SUPPLY 

Natural Resources. — Wherever and however men live, they 
are dependent" upon the natural resources of the earth for a 
living. A naturalist on the coast of Australia relates how he 
came across a band of " black fellows," as the natives are called, 
at their camp, or rather lying-down place, for they had no huts 
or shelter of any kind. He hired them to show him the nests 
of a certain species of bird, promising to give them plenty of 
biscuit after they had shown the nests. They were all clothed 
in natural attire, the brown-black skin in which they were 
born, with the addition of a thick coat of white clay and red and 
yellow ochre on their faces and chests. Each man carried one 
or two spears, which he threw at the birds flying overhead. 
One climbed a tree, tore off some onion-like plants growing on 
the upper limbs, and threw them down to his companions, who 
ate them all up before he got down to claim his share. Along a 
stretch of rocky shore were many crabs, which the blacks caught 
and ate raw and alive. They also found sea snails with shells 
three or four inches long, which they strung on a reed stem to 
hang in the sun until the animal should die and putrefy, so that 
it could be drawn out and eaten. Some bulbs like Indian turnip 
were dug up and tied in their hair, to be cooked in the future. 
A lizard and a grub six inches long were tussled for, torn in 
pieces, and swallowed on the spot. The nests having been 
found and the biscuits handed over, the blacks filled themselves 

263 



204 



ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY 



and lay down to sleep. They cared no more for the traveler 
or his biscuit. One had a short pipe tied to his arm, and was 
persuaded by the promise of tobacco to pilot the traveler back 
to the shore. 

The wants of these savages are almost as simple as those of 
the animals around them, and they exercise but little more fore- 
thought than the animals 
in providing for them. 
The European colonists 
and their descendants liv- 
ing in the same country 
make use of a hundred 
natural resources of 
which the savages never 
dreamed. They grow 
wheat, corn, grapes, or- 
anges, and other fruit, 
raise sheep and cattle, and 
mine coal, gold, copper, 
and tin . They have abun- 
dance of bread, meat, and 
fruit to eat, and clothing 
to wear. They use stone, 
brick, timber, and iron in 
constructing houses, ve- 
hicles, and ships. They 
travel with horses, steam 
cars, and automobiles. 
They use gold and silver 
for ornament and coinage. They exchange their own products 
with all the rest of the world for comforts and luxuries which 
they do not find at home. Their wants increase as the means 
of supply increase, and there is no limit to the number of things 
they can use. Yet the civilized man is as dependent upon 
natural resources as the savage. 




Fig. 237. — Australian natives. (Ratzel.) 



NATURAL RESOURCES AND FOOD SUPPLY 265 

Utilization of Natural Resources. — Most natural resources 
must be worked over and utilized by human labor. Crude 
minerals are manufactured into implements and machinery, 
soils are made to yield food products, forests are converted into 
houses and ships. Man's desire to consume and his ability to 
produce have increased together with the progress of civiliza- 
tion. The earth is not only the home of man but also his 
workshop and school — a great " manual- training high school." 
While he has made it more habitable, comfortable, and luxurious, 
it has made him civilized. The study of those natural resources 
which are useful to man, and of the uses which men make of 
them, constitutes the science of economic geography. 1 It dis- 
cusses the influence of natural environment upon human activi- 
ties, and the conscious reaction of man upon his environment. 
It recognizes the relationship between nature and human wel- 
fare, and considers how the earth is fitted for the development 
of civilization. 

The economic progress of man means his ability to make a better living, 
and depends upon natural resources and human faculty. Natural resources 
are practically unchangeable from age to age, but man, through the ex- 
perience of thousands of years and by his increasing knowledge of nature, 
may improve his condition indefinitely. 

Chief Natural Factors. — The chief natural factors of eco- 
nomic geography are (1) the substratum, or ground, including 
minerals, soils, and ground water, (2) climate, (3) plants, and 
(4) animals. Each of these factors contributes to human wel- 
fare directly, and also through its influence on the other factors. 

Soil and ground water combine with climate to determine the character 
of vegetation. Plants manufacture food for animals, and both for man. 
Plants and animals are our neighbors and kinsmen, closely related to us 
physiologically, and more remotely by descent from common ancestors. 
They have developed with man, and their control and conquest have been 
comparatively easy. 

Some natural resources essential for the existence of man are almost 
everywhere present, and so abundant as to require little or no attention. 

1 Economy means literally housekeeping, or household management. 



266 ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY 

Among these are air, water, insolation, and land. We live at the bottom of 
an ocean of air, which penetrates water and solid earth to great depths. 
The supply is inexhaustible, and it is difficult to shut it out; yet in mines 
and tunnels, fans and pumps are employed to insure safety, and in crowded 
rooms, houses, and cities a sufficient supply of good air is a serious problem. 
On the sea and in deserts the traveler must continually look to his water 
supply or pay the penalty with his life, and water for irrigation is a costly 
commodity. In well-watered regions some energy and expense are generally 
necessary to secure good water for domestic use, .and in cities one of the 
largest items of public expenditure is for water. Insolation, or radiant 
energy from the sun, penetrates the atmosphere, and furnishes heat and 
light to every part of the face of the earth during half of each year. It 
makes plants grow, enables animals to live, and supplies all the power avail- 
able for human industries. 

Land, as terra firma, or a ground upon which men can stand, walk, live, 
and work, is abundant and, as yet, largely unoccupied. There is room 
enough in the state of Texas to contain all the people in the world and to 
give every man, woman, and child a space as large as an ordinary city lot. 
Most of the land is covered by some kind of soil which is workable and 
fertilizable, and its total productive capacity is sufficient to support many 
times the present population of the world. The substratum is only super- 
ficially known and used except in mining, which is limited in depth to about 
one mile. Its surface is generally traversable by roads. 

Food Supply. — The only absolutely necessary thing which man 
must procure to live is food. A part of this is easily obtained 
from the mineral world in the form of air, water, and common 
salt, but man cannot live upon mineral food alone. He must 
depend upon plants to convert mineral matter, air, water, and 
salts into organic substances which he can assimilate. Gener- 
ally he robs plants of the food which they have stored up for 
the next season or the next generation. Bulbs, thickened roots, 
tubers, fruits, nuts, and grains are local concentrations of food 
stuff in the plant which form staple articles of diet for men 
almost everywhere. The animal body contains still more con- 
centrated food stuff, and almost every part, of it except hair, 
feathers, and bones are eaten by men. Shellfish, fish, worms, 
reptiles, birds, and all the higher animals are caught, hunted, or 
bred. Materials provided by animals for the support of their 



NATURAL RESOURCES AND FOOD SUPPLY 



267 



young, such as eggs and milk, are of special value because they 
can be used without killing the animal which produces them. 

Collective Economy. — The simplest way of getting a living is 
that in which men make no effort to produce anything, but live 
by plucking or collecting whatever nature provides, as in the 
case of the Australian black fellows. This is, of course, very 
inefficient, but in tropical countries nature is so prolific that 
people can live with little effort. 

On the coral islands of the Pacific a few coconut trees will support a 
large family. No implements, or only very simple ones, are required. 
There is no incentive to stimulate 
discovery and invention, and men 
remain in a state of savagery. 
Tropical forests, savannas, and 
oceanic islands are most favorable 
for plant collection on account of 
the abundance and variety of ed- 
ible fruits and nuts. Various spe- 
cies of palms, such as the oil palm, 
date palm, sago palm, and coco- 
nut palm, are important sources 
of food supply. The yam, a root 
resembling the sweet potato, and 
the banana, the most prolific of 
all food plants, flourish sponta- 
neously and render labor almost 
unnecessary. 




Fig. 238. — Top of coconut palm. 



Fishing, hunting, and trap- 
ping are forms of collective 
economy which require considerable effort and skill. Imple- 
ments and weapons, such as fishhooks, lines, nets, spears, har- 
poons, bows and arrows, must be designed and made, and the 
successful chase of the larger animals demands trained powers 
of body and mind. 

Hunting furnishes a limited and precarious food supply, abundant at 
one time and scanty at another. A large territory is necessary to support 
a few people. The North American Indians of Columbus's time depended 




268 



NATURAL RESOURCES AND FOOD SUPPLY 



269 




Fig. 240. —Hoe culture. (After Ratzel.) 



upon the chase, and there were probably not more than one million of them 
on the continent north of Mexico. Hunting, trapping, and fishing survive 
and continue among highly civilized peoples. They are still the chief occu- 
pations in the great forest belts of 
.the cold temperate zone. Fishing is . , 

carried on in favorable coast waters 
in all latitudes, but is most pro- 
ductive on both shores of the north 
Atlantic and north Pacific. 



Agriculture. — The domesti- 
cation of plants is a long step 
toward a large and regular food 
supply. It was at first hap- 
hazard from seed accidentally 
sown. The planting and care 
of cultivated plants was begun 
and carried on entirely by 
women, who loosened the soil 
in favorable spots with a stick, 

planted seed, and cultivated the growing crop with rude hoes. 
This was the beginning of hoe culture, which now prevails in the 
equatorial forests and savannas of South America, Africa, and 
the East Indies. The banana, manioc, and yam are the staple 

crops (Fig. 249). As hoe 
culture becomes more effi- 
cient it develops into 
garden culture, which is 
intensive agriculture in 
small plots, the work be- 
ing done mostly by hand. 
With heavy fertilization, 
several crops a year and 
a maximum production 
are possible. It prevails 
in densely populated subtropical countries where labor is cheap, 
as in China, Japan, India, Egypt, and some parts of France, 



mLk«Mf 





Fig. 241. — Garden culture. 



270 



ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY 



Spain, and Italy. The value of the land is sometimes as high 
as $1,000 an acre. Special crops, such as celery, onions, vegeta- 
bles, small fruits, and flowers are grown by improved methods 
of garden culture in many parts of the world. 

Agriculture could not reach its highest stage of efficiency 
until animals were domesticated and trained for draft. Then a 
heavy, crotched stick could be used as a plow, from which the 
many forms of plows and cultivators now in use have been 
evolved. Thus has arisen the prevalent and, on the whole, the 
highest form of agriculture, field culture, carried on in fields and 



S?I 




"^•a ' ' ^--tfr-- 


♦' ; - r"^^v>^3 




r\ 



Fig. 242. — Field culture. 



farms of moderate size, largely by the use of animal power. A 
variety of crops are grown, and domestic animals are bred for 
food as well as for power. Field culture is general in the tem- 
perate regions of North America and Europe, and in smaller 
areas in the other continents. Labor is relatively costly. The 
laborers are free, and often independent owners of the land they 
cultivate, with small or moderate capital. 

In plantation culture (Figs. 245, 248, 260, 261) special crops, 
such as cotton, sugar cane, coffee, tea, and rubber, are grown 



NATURAL RESOURCES AND FOOD SUPPLY 271 

on large tracts. The laborers are often of inferior native or 
imported races, and under some form of servitude; ownership and 
control being in the hands of foreign proprietors with large capital. 

This is the only practicable way, it is said, of utilizing the labor supply 
and developing the agricultural resources of tropical countries. Natives of 
such countries will not work steadily even for large wages, and are made to 
work, if at all, under some sort of compulsion. White men, as a rule, can 
not work in tropical countries; the proprietors find, therefore, that forced 
native labor, or none at all, are the only alternatives. 

Cereal Grains. — The most valuable domesticated food plants 
are the cereal grains, — wheat, corn (maize), rice, oats, rye, and 
barley, — all of which are species of grass, and have been greatly 
modified and improved over the original wild forms. 

Wheat probably originated in the highlands of western Asia. It is now 
extensively grown in the temperate and cool temperate regions of North 




Fig. 243. — Harvesting wheat. 

America and Europe, but is profitable on tropical plateaus and even on 
tropical lowlands as a winter crop. It requires a cool, moist growing sea- 
son and a warm, dry ripening season. There are hundreds of varieties 
each adapted to special conditions of soil and climate; hence its range is 
very wide, extending from the tropic to the polar circle. The world's 
wheat crop is now 3,700 million busftc^ annually. Of this one third is 
raised in temperate Europe, and more than one fourth in temperate North 






272 



ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY 



America. The subtropical countries of Europe and Asia produce about 
one fourth. There was a total increase of nearly one fifth in the ten years 
1 900-1 9 10, which is approximately equal to the increase of population in 
wheat-eating countries. The average yield per acre is from eight bushels 
in Russia to thirty bushels in France, and could be doubled by more scien- 
tific farming. The possible world's wheat crop of the future is closely con- 
nected with the available supply of nitrogen and phosphorus (p. 145). The 
possibilities of wheat growing in southern South America are great, but 
as yet slightly developed. The United States, Canada, Russia, Ukraine, 
Roumania, Hungary, India, and Argentina raise wheat to sell, of which Great 
Britain is the largest purchaser. The people of France, United States, 
Great Britain, Austria, and Hungary consume the most wheat per capita. 

Corn. — Indian corn x or maize originated in the subtropical plateaus of 
America. It was the only cereal known to the American Indians, and is the 

one best fitted for primitive 
hoe culture. Next to rice it 
is now the largest of the 
world's cereal crops and prob- 
ably the largest of all food 
crops. It requires a longer 
and warmer growing season 
than wheat, and many days 
of bright sunshine to ripen it. 
Hence its range is from mid- 
dle temperate to subtropical 
latitudes, and it is excluded 
from oceanic climates of cool 
summers and much cloudi- 
The world's crop is about 4,000 
million bushels, of which the United States produces about 3,000 million 
bushels. It is grown in southern Europe, Argentina, Mexico, India, Egypt, 
and south Africa. More than half the corn crop is fed to animals, chiefly 
swine and cattle, and thus converted into, pork and beef. It is also exten- 
sively used in the manufacture of starch, grape sugar, beer, and alcohol. 
The stalks and leaves furnish excellent fodder for cattle. The direct use 
of the grain for human food is increasing, but in this it still falls far short 
of wheat. 




Fig. 244. — Corn field. 

ness, such as that of the British Isles 



1 Corn is the common name of maize in the United States, but in Great Britain 
corn is a general name for all grains. In England the word usually means wheat; 
and in Scotland oats. 



NATURAL RESOURCES AND FOOD SUPPLY 



273 



Oats. — The second largest cereal crop in temperate climates is oats, 
nearly 4,000 million bushels, of which the United States and Russia pro- 
duce more than 1,000 million bushels each, and Germany half as much. 
Oats thrive in a cooler and damper climate than wheat, and hence have 
a larger range. Most of the crop is fed to horses, but it is excellent for 
human food and its use is increasing. 

Rye. — Rye is a hardier grain than wheat, and can be grown with profit 
on soils where wheat cannot. It is used extensively by the peasants of 
Russia and Germany as a substitute for wheat in making " black bread," 
and in many countries in the manufacture of distilled liquors. The world's 
crop is about 1,500 million bushels, of which Russia produces one half and 
Germany one fourth. 

Barley. — Barley has a wider range of latitude than any other cereal. 
It was once the chief breadstuff of the civilized world, but is now mostly 
fed to stock and converted into malt for brewing beer. The world's crop 
is nearly 1,500 million bushels, one fourth grown in Russia and the rest 
well distributed throughout the grain-producing countries. 

Rice. — The chief cereal grain of warm, wet climates is rice. It is the 
principal food crop of southeastern Asia from India to Japan, and the 




Fig. 245. — Rice field. 



breadstuff of nearly one third the human race. There are several varieties, 
but those extensively grown are water plants and require flooded fields dur- 
ing most of the season. Hence alluvial and delta lands with abundant 
water under control are most favorable. The grain is not generally ground 
to flour, but the processes of hulling and polishing to remove chaff and skin 



2 74 



ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY 




are complex and costly. With the use of improved machinery, similar to 
that used for wheat, the rice crop of southern United States is increasing 

rapidly and now amounts to 40 
million bushels a year. It is impos- 
sible to ascertain the total world's 
crop, but it probably exceeds that 
of any other grain. 

Root Crops. — Root crops 
are well adapted for hoe cul- 
ture, and are generally in- 
dicative of a lower stage of 
civilization than grain crops. 

In tropical countries the yam, 
sweet potato, manioc (cassava), and 
taro can be raised with little labor 
and furnish a large amount of bulky 
food. The manioc of the Amazon 
basin is the source of tapioca used 
in temperate countries for desserts, 
and is being grown in the United 
States as food for cattle. The most valuable root crops are potatoes and 
sugar beets. The potato originated in the high plateaus of tropical South 
America, but from its 
common use in Ireland 
has acquired the name 
of Irish potato. The 
world's crop is about 
5,500 million bushels, of 
which Germany and Rus- 
sia produce more than 
half. Potatoes are used 
in Europe as a source of 
starch and alcohol. 

Sugar Beets are grown 
chiefly in Europe. Ger- 
many, Austria, Hungary, Fig - 2 * 7 ' ~ Sugar beets - 
Russia, and France produce four fifths of the world's crop. Seven million 
tons of sugar, or one third the world's supply, are made from beets. 
They are profitable in cool, dry climates, and supplement the tropical 



Fig. 246. — Potato field. 





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NATURAL RESOURCES AND FOOD SUPPLY 



275 



supply of sugar from 
the cane. The pulp 
from which most of the 
sugar has been extracted 
is used to fatten swine. 

Sugar Cane. — 

Sugar is not merely 
a luxury and a con- 
diment, but a valu- 
able and stimulating 
food. Its use has 
grown in a few cen- 
turies to enormous 




Fig. 248. 



Cutting sugar cane, Louisiana. 

proportions. The source of the largest supply is the sugar cane, 

a species of tropical grass. It 
is grown from cuttings planted 
in deep, rich, moist, but well- 
drained soil, and requires a hot 
season of seven or eight months 
to mature. The canes are cut 
and passed between rollers, 
which press out the juice. The 
liquid is purified and evapo- 
rated until the sugar crystal- 
lizes. It is afterwards refined 
to remove the coloring matter 
and again crystallized into 
white sugar. Cuba, India, 
Java, Hawaii, and Porto Rico 
produce three fourths of the 
world's supply of cane sugar. 
Fruits. — In tropical coun- 
tries fruits are the mainstay 
of life; in temperate countries 
they are in some degree su- 

Fig. 249. — Banana and manioc. (Schimper.; n ... , , • rr-,1 

perfluities and luxuries. I he 



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276 



ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY 



quantity and variety of trop- 
ical fruits spontaneously pro- 
duced encourage collective 
economy only. 

The banana and its near rela- 
tive, the plantain, are the most 
prolific of all food plants and will 
support five times as many people 
per acre as grain. In the East 
Indies the mango and breadfruit, 
and in the oases and irrigated 
tracts of the subtropical deserts 
the date palm, are in themselves 
sufficient to feed a dense popula- 
tion. In the Mediterranean region 
the olive takes the place of but- 
ter and meat. The citrus fruits, 
including many varieties of the 
orange, lemon, and lime, have 
become plentiful in the principal 
markets of the world. The grape 
has a wider range than the fruits 
above mentioned, and is common 

both fresh and in the form of raisins and wine. France produces more wine 

than any other country. 

Of the strictly temperate 

climate fruits, apples are 

the most important, with 

pears, peaches, and plums 

as a secondary crop. 

Cold storage and rapid 

transportation bring the 

fruits of all climes to 

every civilized man's 

door, and at almost all 

seasons. Fruit raising 

partakes of the character Fi e- 2 5* • - Vineyard, New York. 

of both plucking and agriculture, but in the temperate zones it is fast 

becoming a highly specialized branch of scientific agriculture. 




Fig. 250. —Date palms. 




NATURAL RESOURCES AND FOOD SUPPLY 



277 



The Domestication of Animals. — The domestication of 
animals was as important a step in human progress as the 
domestication of plants. One and perhaps the chief cause of 
the backward condition of the American Indians before their 
contact with Europeans was the lack of domestic animals: 
the only animals which they domesticated were small species of 
the camel family in the Andes, and the dog. In well-populated 
countries the dangerous, destructive, and least useful animals 
have been exterminated, and many of the useful wild animals 
nearly so. Domestic animals have been bred, spread, multiplied, 
diversified, and improved until they have lost to a large extent 
their ancestral characters. 

Herding. — In Eurasia domestic animals have been bred 
since prehistoric times. A lasso stage, in which wild animals 




Fig. 252. — Herding in Asia. Tents and utensils are easily moved. 



are caught alive, is intermediate between hunting and breeding. 
The vast steppe regions of central Eurasia have been for thou- 
sands of years the home of peoples whose chief occupation is 



278 



ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY 



herding. Their wealth consists of flocks and herds of cattle, 
horses, sheep, goats, and camels, which are driven from place 
to place in search of fresh pasturage. Hence the people are 
nomadic, having no fixed home, and their houses, usually tents, 
and domestic utensils are all designed to be easily movable. 
Political organization and centralized government are almost 
impossible, and the place of both is filled by patriarchal rule, in 
which the head of the family exercises control over a group, 
consisting of a family of blood relatives, with their wives, chil- 
dren, servants, and dependents. The story of Abraham, Isaac, 
Jacob, and Joseph in the book of Genesis gives a vivid picture 
of nomadic, patriarchal life as it was three thousand years ago, 
and as it still exists to-day. 

Cattle. — Of all the domestic animals, horned cattle are the 
most important and valuable for their flesh, milk, and labor. 

A damp, temperate cli- 
mate, with quick-growing 
grass, is most favorable 
for cattle. Mountainous 
and oceanic lands pro- 
duce the best milk, steppe 
regions the best meat. 
The Mediterranean cli- 
mates, with dry summers, 
are distinctly unfavora- 
ble. In some parts of 
Africa cattle cannot exist 
on account of a disease 
communicated by the bite 
of the tzetze fly. 




Fig. 253. — Herding cattle, United States. 



Cattle are numerous in all 
the good agricultural countries 
of the world, and number about 460 millions. Europe has about 125 
millions, India 140 millions, the United States 68 millions, and Argentina 
2 s millions. In the " Great Plains " or steppe region of North America the 



NATURAL RESOURCES AND FOOD SUPPLY 



279 



vast herds of wild bison, or buffaloes, which once occupied them, have been 
displaced by domestic cattle under the care of "cowboys." The cattle 
thrive on the nutritious bunch grass, which cures spontaneously on the 
ground, and some live out all winter by scraping away the snow with their 
hoofs. When the grass is covered with ice and sleet the losses from cold 
and starvation are very large. The former free range on public lands is 
now generally broken up and fenced into large ranches under private own- 
ership, and the cattle are fed in the winter with cut hay. The farmers of- 
the middle western states buy large numbers of young cattle from the 
ranches to fatten on corn and fodder. Kansas City, Omaha, St. Louis, 
and Chicago are the principal cattle markets and slaughtering and packing 
centers of the world. 

The pampas of the Plata region of South America furnish a vast 
extent of pasturage which has never been fully utilized. Herds of cattle 
have been bred there and slaughtered for their hides only, but with cold 
storage and improved means of transportation the flesh is also marketed. 
South Africa, Australia, and New Zealand are also favorable regions for 
cattle raising. Eastern United States and Canada, Ireland, the Nether- 
lands, Denmark, Sweden, Finland, France, and Switzerland are the leading 
dairy countries. 

The zebu or humped cattle of India are adapted to savannas, and the 
water buffalo (Fig. 254), the principal beast of burden and draft in China, 
Japan, and the Philippines, where it is known as the carabao, is as well 
adapted for service in tropical swamps as the camel for the desert. On 
the plateaus and mountains of Asia, above 6,000 feet, the yak is the most 
hardy beast of burden, and is used also for milk and flesh. 

Sheep. — The sheep 
is a steppe animal and 
does best in dry sub- 
tropical and temper- 
ate lands (Fig. 202). 
Sheep will live upon 
short, scanty pas- 
turage where cattle 
would starve, and if 
permitted will do se- 
rious injury to graz- 
ing grounds. Large, 




Fig. 254. — Water buffalo, Siam. 



28o 



ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY 




coarse-wooled sheep are bred for mutton, and smaller, fine- 
wooled animals for wool. In a wet climate the wool is poor, 

and in a hot climate it is 
scanty. Australia, the Plata 
countries, Russia, and the 
United States lead in the 
production of wool, mutton, 
and hides. Frozen mutton 
is shipped from Australia 
and New Zealand to Europe. 
The total number of sheep 
in the world is estimated at 
more than 575 millions. 

Goats are hardy animals, and 

will pick up a good living from 

coarse, rough herbage which cattle 

and sheep would not eat. In 

Fig. 255. - Goat, Switzerland. mountainous countries and regions 

of scant summer rain, they are bred for their flesh and their milk, which is 

very rich. Goat and kid skins are used extensively in the manufacture of 

gloves. 

Horses. — The horse attains his highest perfection on the 
steppes, where he is admirably adapted for riding, and is used in 
the chase, in herding, and in war. Eastern Europe and north 
Africa have been repeatedly invaded and overrun by horsemen 
from the Asiatic steppes. The horse's leg is a combination of 
levers which makes it mechanically the most efficient of animal 
motor machines. In Asia mares are bred for their milk, which 
forms the staple food of many nomad peoples. The flesh is 
sometimes eaten. The horse is most used among the most 
advanced peoples, and may be regarded as the characteristic 
animal of civilization. 

Many varieties have been developed for speed, beauty, and strength 
and used for riding, driving, and draft. Horse racing is a favorite sport 
among British, French, and American people. No other animal is so inti- 
mately related to human activities, and in spite of the multiplication of 
other means of locomotion, the horse is not likely to lose his place as the 



NATURAL RESOURCES AND FOOD SUPPLY 



281 




Fig. 256. — Burro. 



most useful servant of mankind. The number of horses in the world is 
about 95 millions. 

The ass, or donkey, or burro, is less intelligent than the horse, but more 
hardy and sure-footed. He thrives on coarse fodder, is strong in proportion 
to his size, and is very useful as a 
beast of burden in rough countries. 
The mule, a cross between the ass 
and the mare, inherits the good 
qualities of both parents, and will 
perform hard service in rough and 
hot countries where the horse 
would fail. In 1898 it was found 
necessary to supply the British 
army in South Africa with mules 
shipped from the United States 
at a cost of $1,000 a head. 

Swine. — Pork has come 
to be second only to beef in 
the meat supply of the world. 
The hog is omnivorous in his diet and never-failing in appetite. 
He is the only animal that, beginning at birth, can gain, on the 
average, a pound a day in weight for 250 days. He is the poor 
man's animal, because he can subsist largely upon the waste 
products of the forest and farm. In China swine are the only 
large domestic animals, and pork is the only flesh food used 
by the common people, except birds and fish. More swine are 
raised in the United States than in any other country, and a 
large part of the corn crop is converted into pork. There are 
not less than 180 million swine in the world. 

Camels. — The camel (Fig. 293) is the domestic animal of the 
warm deserts, to which he is wonderfully well adapted. His feet 
are expanded into large pads, which prevent his sinking into the 
sand. His stomach is triple and can hold several gallons of 
water. His nostrils are slits which can be voluntarily closed 
when the air is full of wind-driven sand. His hump is a mass 
of fat, which is absorbed when food is insufficient. He can 
carry a load of 400 to 1,000 pounds, drink brackish water, and 



282 



ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY 



go a month without drinking. In the deserts of Asia and north 
Africa he is the indispensable beast of burden. In disposition 
he is stupid and vicious. 

Four small species of the camel family are natives of the Andes moun- 
tains. The llama (Fig. 222) is used in Peru and Bolivia as a beast of burden, 
but will carry a load of only 80 pounds. The vicuna and guanaco are raised 
for flesh and wool, and the alpaca furnishes a hair of considerable value for 
dress goods. 

Reindeer. — The reindeer bears the same relation to the 
tundra as the camel to the warm deserts. Its foot is adapted 
to snow as the camel's to sand. It is bred in northern Eurasia 
for milk, flesh, and draft. A Lapland family may keep a herd 
of 500 reindeer. They have recently been introduced into Alaska 
and are found very serviceable. 

Dogs. — The dog was originally a wolf which hung around 
human habitations to steal food. He was at first tolerated and 
finally adopted as a domestic parasite. He is the only animal 
except the cat which man has come to regard as a member of 
the family. He has been found useful as a scavenger, for food, 
herding, hunting, and draft; but the large majority of dogs are 
of no use except as pets and companions. In ice deserts, tun- 
dras, and cold temperate for- 
ests in 'winter, dogs are in- 
dispensable draft animals, 
all travel and transportation 
being by dog sledge. The 
Arctic or Eskimo dog is but 
little better than a wolf in 
disposition, but he is strong 
and hardy, can live on frozen 
fish, and can sleep out of 
doors in any weather. 

Elephants. — The elephant 
is kept in domestication in 
India and Siam and used for riding, hunting, and display. His 
strength and intelligence render him valuable in more menial 




Fig. 257. — Elephant. 



NATURAL RESOURCES AND FOOD SUPPLY 



283 



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Fig. 258. — Poultry. 



employments, such as haul- 
ing and piling timber. The 
wild African elephant has 
been hunted for pleasure and 
for his tusks, which furnish 
ivory, until the species is 
threatened with extinction. 

Poultry. — The domestic 
birds include the common 
fowl, goose, duck, pigeon, 
turkey, guinea fowl, peafowl, 
and ostrich. The common 
barnyard fowl, descended from the wild jungle cock of India, is 
one of the most valuable of animals. Many varieties have been 
developed by breeding and have spread to nearly all parts of 
the habitable world. The flesh and eggs are so palatable and 
nutritious as to be generally esteemed as semi-luxuries. The 
total value of poultry and eggs produced in the United States 
annually is about $1,200,000,000. 

Geese and ducks are waterfowl bred for flesh, eggs, and feathers. Do- 
mestic pigeons are largely " fancy " birds, bred to many fantastic forms 
and used to a limited extent as food. The turkey, the only domestic bird 
native to America, is scarcely known elsewhere. The guinea fowl from 
Africa and the peafowl from Asia are more ornamental than useful. The 
African ostrich (Fig. 221) is valuable for his plumes. 

Insects. — The only domesticated insects are the silkworm 
and the bee. 

The breeding and care of the honey bee has become a highly 
specialized art in nearly all civilized countries. The honey is 
made by the bees from the nectar of flowers and stored in combs 
or cells of wax for their own use and for feeding the young. 
With proper management a swarm of bees will produce a large 
surplus beyond their own needs. 

The silkworm is the caterpillar of a moth which spins a cocoon 
yielding the fiber of raw silk. The caterpillars are hatched and led 
upon the leaves of mulberry trees which are grown for the purpose. 



284 



ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY 



China, Japan, and Italy 
furnish 95 per cent of all the 
raw silk that is produced. 

Physiological Luxuries and 
Medicines. — There is a large 
class of substances, mostly 
of vegetable origin, which 
have little or no value as 
food, but which men use in- 
ternally for various purposes. 
They include spices, condi- 
ments, and flavors which give 
food an agreeable taste or 
stimulate digestion, stimu- 
lants and narcotics which 
produce agreeable sensations, 
and medicines which relieve 
pain or assist in the cure of 
disease. 

Condiments and Spices. — In the Middle Ages, spices were 
among the most valuable goods which could be marketed in 
Europe, because they rendered dried and salted meats and 
poorly cooked food more palatable. Arabia was called " the 
land of spices " because the supply came through that country 
from the Far East. The blockade of the caravan routes by the 
Turks stimulated efforts to open a sea route to the " spice 
islands " and led directly to the voyages of Da Gama around 
Africa and of Columbus to America. 




Fig. 259. — Feeding silkworms. 

The silkworms are the white objects in the trays. 



Mustard is now the most important condiment and the most widely dis- 
tributed. It is made from the seed of several plants grown in Europe, the 
United States, Asia, and the East Indies. Vinegar, made from cider, wine, 
and other alcoholic liquors, is in common Use in all civilized countries. 

Spices are tropical products grown in India, Ceylon, China, the East 
and West Indies, Zanzibar, Mexico, and South America. Pepper is made 
from dried berries, cloves from flower buds, nutmegs from fruit stones, 



NATURAL RESOURCES AND FOOD SUPPLY 



285 



cinnamon from bark, and ginger from roots. Cayenne or red pepper and 
vanilla are the fruits of plants grown chiefly in Mexico. 

Stimulants and Narcotics. — Alcoholic liquors are used by 
people of nearly all races, countries, and classes. Their Use is 
prohibited among the believers of the Mohammedan religion. 
They are made by the fermentation of sugar derived from fruits, 
grains, roots, or any material containing starch. The yeast 
plant, a microscopic organism, is the only agent known by 
which sugar can be converted into alcohol cheaply and on a 
large scale. The yeast is added to a solution containing sugar 
or allowed to grow from spores everywhere present in the air. 

Wines of many varieties are made from the fermentation of grape juice, 
and are the common beverage in the warm temperate regions of Europe. 
Beer is made from barley or corn and is a favorite drink in northern 
Europe. Distilled liquors contain a much higher percentage of alcohol 
than wine or beer. Whisky is distilled from corn, rye, and potatoes, 
brandy from wine, and rum from sugar cane. In Japan sake is made from 
rice, in Mexico pulque from 
the century plant, and in 
India toddy from the coco- 
nut palm. From any of these 
sources pure alcohol may be 
obtained by careful distilla- 
tion, and is manufactured in 
large quantities, not for drink- 
ing, but as a chemical product 
used in many important arts 
and for fuel. Alcohol has no 
direct food value, but is a 
stimulant and intoxicant, more 
or less injurious to body and 
mind. 

Coffee, lea, mate, and 
cocoa are mild stimulants, 
not intoxicating, and gen- 
erally harmless. Coffee is the seed of a small tree grown by the 
plantation system chiefly in Brazil, and in smaller quantities in 
Venezuela, Central America, Java, Mexico, and the West Indies. 




Fig. 260. — Coffee plantation, Straits Settlements. 



286 



ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY 




Fig. 261 . — Picking tea. 



Brazil furnishes about two thirds of the 2,600 million pounds 
exported annually. It is used more largely in the United States 

than in any other country. 

Tea is the dried young leaves 
of a shrub which yields best on 
tropical highlands with warm, 
rainy summers. China and 
Japan have had until recently 
a monopoly of tea growing, 
but now the plantations of 
India and Ceylon furnish three 
fifths of the 770 million pounds 
exported. Russia and Great 
Britain are the largest con- 
sumers of tea. Verba mate, or 
Paraguay tea, consists of the 
dried leaves of a tree growing 
wild in southern South America and possesses the same stimula- 
ting qualities as tea. Its use is local, very little being exported. 

Cocoa and chocolate are pre- 
pared from cacao beans, the 
seeds of a tree which grows 
in the lowlands of tropical 
America, the East Indies, and 
west Africa. They contain a 
mild stimulant and a large 
percentage of oil, starch, and 
albuminoids which render them 
highly nutritious. 

Tobacco and opium are nar- 
cotic stimulants possessing 
decided physiological and me- 
dicinal properties. Tobacco, 
originally a native of America, 
has in the last 300 years ex- Fig. 262. — Cacao tree. 




NATURAL RESOURCES AND FOOD SUPPLY 



287 




Fig. 263. — Tobacco field. 



tended over the entire world, and has come into general use 
among all kinds of people. Naturally a semi-tropical plant, it 
is now grown as far north as Connecticut, Wisconsin, and Ger- 
many. Its quality, flavor, 
and value are greatly modi- 
fied by soil, climate, cultiva- 
tion, and curing. It requires 
a growing season at least as 
long as corn, but is much 
more exhausting to the soil. 

The whole plant is cut and hung 
up to dry, the leaves are stripped 
off and slightly " sweated " or fer- 
mented, the stems are removed 
and the blades rolled into cigars 
or put up in various forms for 
smoking and chewing. The " seed 
leaf " used for cigar wrappers is 
grown in Sumatra, the Philippines, 
and the Connecticut valley, where the gross value of the crop is sometimes 
$10,000 an acre. The relation of tobacco to the human race is unique. 
Purely a luxury, and with no beneficial effect upon the system, it is a mild 
narcotic which, though usually injurious, is not ruinous, and has an attrac- 
tion for people of all classes, from the most degraded to the most refined, 
possessed by no other substance except, perhaps, alcohol. The United 
States produces about one half the crop of 2,200 million pounds. 

Opium is the dried juice of the white poppy grown in India, 
China, Persia, and Turkey. It is smoked in small pipes as a 
narcotic by the Chinese and other Oriental peoples. Its effects 
are much more serious than those of tobacco, and opium smok- 
ing in China has become a national danger. Morphine, lauda- 
num, and other derivatives of opium are extensively used in 
medicine to relieve pain, but should never be taken except 
under the direction of a physician, since there is grave danger of 
acquiring the opium habit, which is very difficult to cure. 

Medicines. — Medicines are largely extracted from crude 
drugs, or the dried bark, leaves, and seeds of plants. The vari- 



288 ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY 

eties in common use are very numerous, and most of them are 
of great value for the relief and cure of disease. Of substances 
which are purely medicinal, wholly beneficial, and almost in- 
valuable to man, quinine may be taken as a type. It is obtained 
from the bark of the cinchona tree, a native of the tropical 
South American forest. The natural supply has long been 
insufficient, and the cinchona plantations of Java now furnish 
86 per cent of the 17 million pounds of bark required to supply 
the world. Quinine is the only safe and efficient antidote to 
malaria, and without it the occupation of the tropics by white 
men would have been impossible. 



CHAPTER XX 

CLOTHING AND CONSTRUCTIVE MATERIALS 

Clothing. — After food, the object for which the greatest 
amount of human energy is expended is clothing. Clothes are 
not naturally as important as they seem. They are not required 
and are not worn for protection by half the people in the world. 
The natives of Tierra del Fuego in 55 S. Lat. go naked and do 
not appear to suffer. In tropical regions the common people 
wear very little clothing, and that chiefly for ornament. Civil- 
ized people are prevented from going naked by a sense of 
modesty, and a sense of what is becoming or in fashion deter- 
mines the material, cut, style, color, and other details. The 
simplest of all dress is the coat of clay and mineral paint used 
by the Australian black fellow, or the mixture of grease and 
soot with which a Central African belle anoints herself. They 
are regarded as ornamental, and they furnish some protection 
against insects. Some articles of clothing have come into use 
for convenience in carrying small articles, as the belt around the 
waist, and bands around the arms. Simple clothing is often 
made of leaves, bark, grass, or straw, more or less skillfully 
braided or woven together. In regions of cold winters, men 
rob animals of their fur, feathers, and skins. 

All these things are obtainable by collective economy, but herding and 
agriculture are necessary to supply light, pliable, comfortable, and durable 
garments, which are generally woven from some kind of fiber, and are 
therefore called textiles. The principal vegetable fibers are cotton and 
linen, and the principal animal fibers are wool and silk. 

Cotton. — The hairs which cover the seeds and fill the bolls 
of the cotton plant furnish the best fiber known for cloth and 
small cordage. It is strong, soft, fine, flexible, and easily dyed 

289 



290 



ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY 



and washed, — an almost ideal combination of qualities. Cotton 
produces the best fiber in a tropical climate near salt water. 
It is grown from seed, cultivated like corn, and picked usually 




Fig. 264. — Cotton field, South Carolina. 

by hand. The seeds are separated from the fiber by a machine 
called a gin, and contain an oil valuable for food and for soap 
making. 

On account of the large amount of hand labor required, cotton has gen- 
erally been grown by the plantation system. The invention of the gin, the 
spinning jenny, and the power loom, in the latter part of the eighteenth 
century, made it possible to utilize large quantities of the fiber, which stimu- 
lated production and increased the supply until cotton became the cheapest 
and most plentiful of all textiles. The invention of a successful machine 
for picking cotton will put cotton cloth practically within reach of every 
human being. The world's cotton crop is about 10,000 million pounds, of 
which the United States produces one half, India one fifth, and Asiatic 
Russia one twelfth. 

Linen. — Linen is made from the fiber of the stem of the 
flax plant. The process of separating it from the wood and 
preparing it for spinning is long and difficult. Hence linen is 
far more expensive than cotton, and is used for laces, napkins, 



CLOTHING AND CONSTRUCTIVE MATERIALS 



291 



and articles of luxury. Flaxseed furnishes linseed oil, which is 
indispensable in mixing good paint. Russia produces about 
four fifths of the world's supply of flax. 

Wool. — The animal fibers most useful for cloth are obtained 
from sheep, goats, and camels, including the alpaca and vicuna. 
Sheep's wool is used in all cold countries for heavy clothing, 
especially that worn by men. Australia and Argentina produce 
about half the wool exported. 

Silk. — The silkworm spins a cocoon of fine, lustrous, elastic 
threads which form the raw silk of commerce. A large amount 
of hand labor is required in feeding and caring for the worms, 
unwinding the threads, and pre- 
paring them for the loom, hence 
the industry is confined to coun- 
tries where wages are low. 

Artificial silk, but little inferior to 
the natural fiber and much cheaper, is 
now being manufactured. For service- 
able clothing silk is inferior to cotton 
and wool, but is superior in beauty. 
It is used extensively for laces, rib- 
bons, and velvets. 

Rubber. — The milky juice 
{latex) of various species of tropi- 
cal plants forms a gummy mass 
when dried, and is used to render 
textiles waterproof. The supply 
obtained from native wild plants 
in Brazil is now small compared 
with that from cultivated plan- 
tations in the Straits Settlements, 
Malay States, and Ceylon. 

Furs and Leather. — The skins 
of animals have always formed 
an important part of human clothing, either cured with the fur 
on or converted into leather. Deerskin was the chief reliance 




Fig. 265. — Rubber trees. 

The marks on the trees are cuts in the 
bark, from which to collect the sap. 



r: 



292 



ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY 




Fig. 266. — Straw hut, Hawaii. 



of the North American Indian, as sealskin is of the Eskimo, and 
sheepskin of the shepherd peoples of Eurasia. 

Among highly civilized peoples furs have become articles of luxury, 
and some, such as seal, otter, ermine, marten, sable, beaver, and silver fox, 
command fabulous prices. Canada and Russia are the principal fur-pro- 
ducing countries. Leather, made by soaking hides in a solution of tan- 
bark or other chemical agent which renders them tough and impervious 

to water, has become an indispen- 
sable article for shoes and gloves. 
Thus men protect their extremities 
which are most exposed to rough 
usage. Leather is made from the 
skins of cattle, horses, swine, sheep, 
goats, dogs, and many other an- 
imals. 

Shelter. — Few, if any, hu- 
man beings live so simply as 
never to need shelter of any 
kind. Some kind of a lair is 
necessary as a place for rest and sleep. A tree, forest, over- 
hanging rock, or cave may furnish shelter from heat, cold, wild 
animals, or enemies, and men 
soon learn to improve these 
natural advantages. Sticks, 
grass, leaves, and boughs are 
among the most easily availa- 
ble materials, and a large part 
of the human race still live 
in more or less elaborate huts 
made from them. With the 
progress of the mechanic arts 
men have become able to use 
trees for timber and to con- 
struct from them commodious 
and luxurious homes. Hence Fig. 267.— Log house. 

have arisen all the refinements of lumbering, carpentry, and 
cabinet work. 




CLOTHING AND CONSTRUCTIVE MATERIALS 



293 



Among the early inhabitants of Europe were the cave men, who inhabited 
the natural limestone caverns, furnished them with the skins of wild beasts, 
and even decorated their walls with 
paintings. In some parts of France 
inhabited houses and even churches 
are still made by enlarging and im- 
proving natural caverns. In China 
thousands of people live in houses 
dug out of the soft but firm deposits 
of loess (p. 144), and the pioneer 
in the American prairies and steppes 
often lives at first in a " dugout " 





Fig. 269. — Sod house. (U.S.G.S.) 



Fig. 268. — Rock house, France. (Robin.) 

or in a sod house. The Eskimo 
finds chunks of frozen snow cut to 
proper shape the best material for 
building a hut adapted to his needs 

in an Arctic climate. In countries of small rainfall and with alluvial or 

adobe soils, sun-dried bricks are 

easily made and built into huts or 

houses which are comfortable and 

permanent. 

In most parts of the world 
clay is plentiful, from which 
bricks can be made and hard- 
ened by burning into excel- 
lent building materials. Many 
kinds of rock, such as sand- 
stone, limestone, granite, and 
slate, are quarried and used to construct the most substantial 




Copyright by Doubleday, Page & Co. 

Fig. 270. — Igloo .or Eskimo snow house. 



294 



ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY 



and imposing buildings. For many thousand years various ores, 
especially those of iron, have been mined and smelted and the 
extracted metals used in all sorts of construction. Hence the 
industries of quarrying, mining, and metallurgy have grown to 

enormous proportions. These 
industries belong to scientific 
collective economy, since they 
collect and utilize natural 
materials, but do not produce 
them as in agriculture or 
stock raising. 

Timber. — Of all materials 
for construction wood is the 
most generally useful, and for 
most purposes that furnished 
by the coniferous forests (pp. 
234-236) is the best. 

Pine, spruce, fir, hemlock, larch, 
cedar, and redwood lumber is light, 
strong, durable, and easily worked, 
and can be had in pieces of large 
dimensions. None is better than 
the white pine of North America, 
which is ten times as strong as 
steel of equal weight. The yellow 
or hard pine of the southern states 
is full of resin, from which turpen- 
tine, rosin, and tar are extracted. 
The timber is hard, strong, dura- 
ble, and fit for heavy construction, 
while its beautiful color and grain 
make it desirable for inside work 
in houses. The Douglas fir of the 
Pacific coast of North America is especially valuable in ship-building on 
account of the length and size of timbers which can be cut from it. Cali- 
fornia redwood, a near relative of the Sequoias, or "big trees," is famous 
for the size of the individual trees and the yield of merchantable lumber 
per acre. Redwoods grow from 200 to 300 feet high, with a diameter of 




Fig. 271. — Redwoods. 

200 to 300 feet high. 



CLOTHING AND CONSTRUCTIVE MATERIALS 295 

10 to 20 feet, and so close together that it is difficult to drive a wagon 
between them. The redwood forests are confined to the Coast Ranges 
of California and Oregon, and at the present rate of cutting are likely to 
disappear at an early date. White spruce is being cut at a rapid rate 
for the manufacture of paper pulp. White cedars are used largely for 
posts, telegraph poles, and shingles; and red cedar, or juniper, is familiar 
in lead pencils. These cedars are well distributed throughout the forest 
regions of the United States and Canada. The hemlock of the north and 
the cypress of the south are inferior to the pine as timber trees, but- are 
used as a substitute for it. The Norway spruce, the European pine, fir, 
and larch, and the Indian cypress and deodar are among the chief timber 
trees of their respective countries. The area of coniferous forests in north- 
ern North America and Eurasia is very large (Fig. 192). No part of it is 
more valuable than that on the Pacific coast from California to Alaska. 

The broad-leaved and generally deciduous timber trees are 
more widely distributed and of greater variety than the con- 
iferous trees. 

The tulip tree, poplar, and linden, or basswood, common in eastern 
United States, furnish soft, light wood easily worked. The linden is corn- 




Fig. 272. — Floating logs to a sawmill. (U.S.G.S.) 

mon in Europe. Of close-grained hardwoods the maple, beech, birch, and 
sycamore, or plane tree, exist in many species throughout temperate North 
America and Europe. Among the coarse-grained hardwoods the oaks hold 
the first place in number of species, wide distribution, and value of timber. 



296 



ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY 



They are the most abundant timber trees of eastern North America and 
Europe, and extend across south central Asia to Japan. Cork is the bark 
of a species of oak growing in the Mediterranean region. The ash, chest- 
nut, elm, hickory, locust, and 
many other less important 
trees furnish wood of much 
value for various purposes. 
Among the woods famous for 
their beauty of color and 
grain, and commanding high 
prices for furniture, cabinet 
work, and interior finish, the 
black walnut, butternut, 
cherry, and gum are native 
to eastern United States. 
Still more highly prized is 
mahogany, imported from 
tropical America and west 
Africa to Europe and the 
United States. Rosewood and 

Fig. 273 . - Sawmill, North Carolina. (U.S.G.S.) ebony are Epical woods used 
entirely for fancy or ornamental purposes. One of the most valuable of 
all woods for heavy construction is the teak of India, Indo-China, and the 
East Indies. The gum 
or eucalyptus trees of 
Australia are not much 
inferior to teak. 

Lumbering. — 

Lumbering is a form 
of specialized collec- 
tive economy, which 
consists in cutting 
trees into logs and 
transporting them by- 
sled, wagon, rail, or 
water to mills to be 










~*t 

'"X 
j*-*— *» 


ri 

T 








- 




r: : - 


• ' •' ■ ' '■ '.jj 


ill 


" i Ii*< 



(U.S.G.S.) 



Fig. 274. — Burned forest, Washington. 

sawed, planed, and otherwise elaborated for particular uses. 

The people of Europe and the United States have destroyed their native 

forests to such an extent that timber has become scarce and high-priced. 



CLOTHING AND CONSTRUCTIVE MATERIALS 



297 



The future supply must be largely imported from the northern forests, or 
much of the land originally timbered must be reforested. The conserva- 
tion of forests, which includes the cutting of timber without unnecessary 
waste, the prevention of forest fires, and the replanting of tracts of little 
value for other purposes, is one of the most important problems of present- 
day economics. The science of forestry has been highly developed in Ger- 
many and is being taken up in the United States. 




Fig. 275- 



- Result of deforestation, China. The land has been ruined by erosion. 
(Carnegie Institution, Research in China.) 



Paper. — Paper is made from various vegetable fibers by 
grinding and digesting to a pulp, which is then rolled into sheets. 
Fine book and writing papers are made from linen, coarse 
wrapping paper from straw, and newspaper from wood pulp. 
The spruce forests of North America are being rapidly used up 
in the manufacture of wood pulp. 

Clay. — Of all minerals used in construction, clay is the most 
widely diffused and readily available. It is a product of the 
decay of feldspar. By mixing, molding, and heating, common 



298 



ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY 




Fig. 276. — Clay works. 



clay is made into building, 
paving, and fire brick, tiling, 
sewer pipe, and pottery. Pure 
clay, or kaolin, is mixed with 
other materials to make fine 
porcelain and chinaware. 

Cement. — Mortar made 
of quicklime and sand is gen- 
erally used to bind brick and 
stone work together. In re- 
cent years, owing partly to 
the increasing cost of wood, 
hydraulic or Portland cement, 
made by heating and grind- 
ing a mixture of clay and 
lime, has come into gen- 
eral use. The mixture of cement, sand, and gravel or broken 
stone called concrete is really an artificial conglomerate, and 
is displacing brick and 
other materials in pav- 
ing and house building. 
When reinforced by an 
imbedded framework of 
steel, concrete is superior 
to steel or stone alone 
for bridge construction. 
Building Stone. — 
Stone is used the world 
over for foundations, 
bridge piers, docks, break- 
waters, pavements, pub- 
lic buildings, and costly 
private structures. Its 
value depends upon many Fig - 277 - ~ Q™«yk« ««"*». New Hampshire, 
factors, such as ease of quarrying and working, strength under 
a crushing load, hardness, color, and resistance to weather. 





mT : wt- " w f^ &^M&nsE!J& 


■SNI 






"* ' ,4 I ffUksi 




*^fef^S0--«'mM 




W ' 1 f^w'iPV M 




'*a^m^Btr$$!fow^J^Uh 4S&^~ 


''"vM^L.cJ 


'■^^^s^^mBp 







CLOTHING AND CONSTRUCTIVE MATERIALS 



299 



Probably limestone is most extensively used, but sandstone, granite, 
and volcanic rocks of various kinds are valuable. Metamorphic limestone, 
or marble, on account of its beautiful colors and the high polish of which 
it is capable, is a favorite ornamental stone for buildings, monuments, 
statuary, and furniture. 

Quartz, the most abundant of all solid minerals, occurs in 
massive quartzite and sandstone, in common sand, and in trans- 
parent crystals. It has many colors. 

Agate, amethyst, onyx, chalcedony, carnelian, chrysoprase, heliotrope, 
jasper, opal, and many other varieties of quartz are semi-precious stones 
prized for their color and luster. Millstones, grindstones, and whetstones 
are fine-grained sandstones. Flint is a hard variety of quartz which was 
used all over the world before the discovery of iron for weapons and cutting 
implements. Glass is made by heating a mixture of pure quartz sand and 
soda ash to a very high temperature. Most glass articles are shaped by 
blowing air into melted glass through a metal tube. Various ingredients 
are added to give color, luster, and other special qualities. 

Ores and Metals. — An ore is a mineral from which a metal 
may be profitably extracted. Most ores have been deposited 
by solution in ground water 
which rises from the depths 
of the earth, and occur in fis- 
sures called veins, lodes, and 
leads; consequently valuable 
deposits of ore are found 
chiefly in mountainous re- 
gions, where the earth crust 
has been broken, and in old, 
worn-down plains (pp. 44, 53, 
58) from which a great thick- 
ness of the crust has been re- 
moved by erosion. 

Iron. — Of all the metals, 
iron is the most useful to 
mankind. No people have ever been able to attain a high state 
of civilization without the use of iron. It is the physical basis 




Fig. 278. — Iron mine, Minnesota. 



3°° 



ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY 



of modern industry. Its extraction from the ore is difficult 
and requires such a high temperature that the progress of the 
human race was delayed thousands of years for lack of it. 

As long as all implements and tools were made of wood, with points 
and cutting edges of stone, no great material civilization was possible. 
Iron is supreme because it is abundant, strong, and workable. When hot 
it can be hammered into shape, when melted it can be cast in molds, and in 
the form of steel it can be given a high degree of hardness and elasticity. 
If kept dry it is very durable, but if damp it rapidly rusts. 

Iron ores are smelted with charcoal or coke, and limestone to absorb 
impurities, in a furnace which is raised by a blast of hot air to a tempera- 




Fig. 279. — Blast furnaces, Gary, Ind. 

ture of nearly 3,000 degrees. The liquid metal drawn from the furnace is 
pig or cast iron, which is moderately hard and relatively brittle, but can 
be cast in molds of almost any desired size and shape. Cast iron, when 
purified, forms wrought iron, which is soft and flexible but tough and 
malleable. By various processes cast iron can be converted into steel, 
which possesses all the best qualities of iron. It can be cast, hammered, 
rolled into railroad rails, bars, beams, girders, and sheets, and tempered for 
cutting tools and springs. 

Iron is the most widely diffused of metals, and iron ores are found in 
every land ; but the best ores, which furnish most of the world's supply, are 
mined in the Lake Superior region of the United States and Canada, in 
Great Britain, Germany, Belgium, and Spain. . Sweden has immense masses 
of high-grade ore not yet fully developed. The United States is far in 



CLOTHING AND CONSTRUCTIVE MATERIALS 301 

advance of all other countries in the production of iron ore, pig iron, and 
steel, with Germany and Great Britain as second and third in rank. The 
quantity of iron used is the best measure of industrial progress. 

Copper. — Next to iron, copper is probably the most im- 
portant metal. It is workable, durable, and moderately hard. 
Before the discovery of iron smelting, bronze, an alloy of copper 
and tin, played the part now taken by iron and steel, and it is 
still used for statuary and ornamental work. 

Brass is an alloy of copper and zinc. The peculiar value of copper lies 
in the fact that it is one of the best known conductors of heat and elec- 
tricity, and can be drawn into strong wire. Hence it is indispensable in 
the development of modern electrical industry. The mines of Arizona, 
Montana, and Michigan produce more than half of all the copper mined. 
Japan, Chile, and Canada rank next after the United States. 

Lead. — Lead is a soft, heavy metal easily melted or shaped 
in the cold. It is used for shot, bullets, roofing, and plumbers' 
work. Solder, pewter, and type metal are alloys of lead. 

White lead, a compound of the metal, is one of the essential ingredients 
of good paint. Lead occurs with silver in Idaho, Utah, and Colorado, and 
with zinc in Missouri. The United States, Spain, Germany, and Australia 
produce three fourths of the world's supply. 

Zinc. — ■ Zinc is a hard, white metal which is not corroded by air or 
water. It is extensively used as a coating for sheet steel to prevent it from 
rusting. Such sheets, under the name of galvanized iron, are used for tanks, 
roofing, cornices, spouts, water pipes, and domestic utensils. The United 
States, Germany, and Belgium yield four fifths of the world's supply. 

Tin. — Tin is a soft, white metal which was once semi-precious on 
account of its scarcity and the demand for it in making bronze. It is very 
useful in the form of tin plate, which consists of sheets of iron coated with 
tin and used for roofing and " tinware." The tin mines of Cornwall, Eng- 
land, have been worked for 2,500 years, but the Malay Peninsula and 
neighboring islands and Bolivia now furnish three fourths of the supply. 

Aluminum. — Aluminum, the lightest of the commercial metals, is also 
the most abundant, being the base of all clays and forming eight per cent of 
the earth crust. The difficulty of extraction from its ores makes it costly. 
In color, luster, and polish it resembles tin. It does not corrode, is work- 
able, and is a good conductor of electricity. It is about one third as heavy 



3°2 



ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY 



as iron and may be substituted for it in places where lightness and strength 
are desirable. Its workable ores are rare. The metal is extracted at 
Niagara Falls and Massena, N. Y., and Badin, N. C. 

Mercury. — Mercury, the only metal liquid at ordinary temperatures, is 
invaluable in the extraction of gold from its ores, in the manufacture of ther- 
mometers, barometers, and other scientific instruments, and in silvering mir- 
rors. Italy, Austria, Spain, and California furnish 85 per cent of the supply. 

Precious Metals. — Gold and silver are known as precious 
metals on account of their high value. An ounce of gold is 

worth a little over 
twenty dollars, and 
an ounce of silver 
from fifty cents to 
one dollar. For use 
in the arts gold is 
inferior to copper, 
and silver is inferior 
to tin. Their value 
depends essentially 
upon their beauty, 
which makes them 
desired for orna- 
ment; hence gold is 
the common mate- 
rial used for jewelry, 
and silver for tableware. Gold has a rich yellow color and a 
brilliant luster which does not readily tarnish. It is easily 
workable, but too soft for use unless alloyed with copper or 
silver to harden it. Silver is white, less lustrous than gold, and 
more easily tarnished; hence it is far inferior in value, although 
more useful in the arts. Gold has become the standard of 
value and a medium of exchange of the civilized world and is 
used chiefly for coinage, while silver is the metal for coins of 
less value. 

Gold is found disseminated in veins, lodes, or reefs of quartz and other 
minerals, and in alluvial sands and gravels. It is separated by crushing 




Fig. 280. — Washing gold, Guiana. (Robin.) 



CLOTHING AND CONSTRUCTIVE MATERIALS 



303 



the ore, when necessary, washing out impurities with running water, and 
dissolving the gold with mercury. Gold is extracted from low-grade ores 
by a solution of potassium cyanide. The world's output of gold is about 
$460,000,000 annually, of which South Africa produces about two fifths, 
the United States one fifth, and Australia one twelfth. 

Silver is obtained largely from lead and gold ores, as well as from ores 
worked for silver alone. Its extraction is difficult and complicated. The 
amount mined is largely in excess of gold, but its total value is less. The 
United States produces one half and Canada and Mexico about one third 
of the world's product. 

Tools. — Man is the only animal that uses tools. It is doubt- 
ful if apes and monkeys, who have hands and could use tools, 
ever spontaneously use even 
a stick or a stone for any 
purpose. Primitive tools 
were of the simplest charac- 
ter. A stick, smoothed, 
straightened, and pointed, 
with the end hardened in the 
fire or tipped with an animal 
tooth, developed into the 
spear and harpoon. A stone 
thrown from the hand or 
from a sling of bark or hide, a club weighted at one end or 
made more effective by the insertion of sharp teeth or stones, 
a flake of flint or broken volcanic glass with a cutting edge, 
were the rude forerunners of the rifle, cannon, ax, sword, scythe, 
knife, and razor. 

The invention of the bow and arrow gave their possessors such an ad- 
vantage in range and accuracy of aim as to rank in importance with the 
discovery of gunpowder. The invention of pottery, made at first by daub- 
ing a basket with clay, then molding the clay without the basket, made it 
possible to store and carry liquids and to cook food by boiling. The smelt- 
ing of iron ore put into men's hands at once a superior material for all 
sorts of implements, weapons, and utensils, enabled them to work wood 
into boats, houses, and furniture, and vastly to improve their agriculture. 
Chiefly by the utilization of wood and iron man has arrived at his present 




Fig. 281. — Primitive tools and weapons. 



304 ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY 

stage of economic development, in which by the use of machines he has 
increased production in an incalculable ratio beyond what he could do 
with his bare hands. The grain binder and thresher, the steam plow, the 
cotton gin, the power loom, the linotype, the cylinder press, the pipe organ, 
the electric crane, the steel steamship, the steam turbine, the gas engine, 
the dynamo, the trolley car, the automobile, and the aeroplane are only 
complex tools for doing work efficiently and on a large scale. They are 
extensions and improvements of the natural machines, — the human leg 
and arm. 

Technical Materials. — The complex activities of civilized 
men require a vast variety of materials for a vast variety of 
purposes. They are derived from many natural sources and 
are artificially made. To describe them and their uses in detail 
would require a large volume. The following are some of the 
most important in each class. 

Fertilizers. — The natural supply of plant food in good soils 
is generally sufficient except in nitrogen, phosphorus, and potash 
(p. 145). Hence these elements are important ingredients of 
artificial fertilizers, and in old and densely populated countries 
their supply is a serious problem. 

Nitrogen is furnished by animal matter, and is a constituent of common 
stable manure. Guano is the dung of fish-eating sea birds, which has 
accumulated upon islands in the almost rainless region off the coast of 
Peru, in some places to the depth of 200 feet. It contains large percent- 
ages of both nitrogen and phosphorus, and many million tons have been 
shipped to England and other countries of western Europe. Bat guano, 
obtained from caves, is used for the same purpose. Chile saltpeter (sodium 
nitrate), containing a large percentage of nitrogen, occurs in extensive 
deposits in the desert of Atacama (Peru and Chile), and has been mined and 
exported to Europe for many years. The supplies of guano and nitrate are 
limited and exhaustible, but the nitrogen of the air is inexhaustible. It has 
been discovered that clover, alfalfa, peas, beans, and other plants of the same 
family, have upon their roots nodules containing bacteria, or microscopic 
plants, which absorb and assimilate nitrogen from the air. When the 
roots decay the nitrogen becomes available for the next crop. Artificial 
nitrate is now being made from air and lime by electricity in Norway, 
where water power is cheap. Thus the nitrogen problem seems to be 
definitely solved. 






CLOTHING AND CONSTRUCTIVE MATERIALS 305 




Copyright by Doub/eday, Page & Co. 

Fig. 282. — Tubercles on the roots of soy bean. (Fletcher's Soils.) 

Phosphorus. — Animal matter generally contains phosphorus as well as 
nitrogen, but it is present in large proportions in fish and in the bones of 
herbivorous animals. Near the seashore fish which are not fit for food 
are caught in nets and liberally applied to the land. Beds of phosphate 
rock in southern United States and other localities are composed largely 
of the teeth and bones of marine animals. Such deposits are of greater 
real value to the human race than gold mines. The phosphorus in them is 
in an insoluble form, and must be chemically treated to make it available 
for plant food. Large quantities of phosphatic fertilizer are made from 
slaughterhouse refuse and the bones of domestic animals. 

Potash. — Wood ashes contain considerable quantities of potash salts, 
which are leached out with water and used in making fertilizers, glass, and 
soap. Potash salts are mined in Germany and France. 

Salt. — Many chemical compounds are found in nature which 
can be utilized in their natural state. The most important is 
common salt (sodium chloride). It is obtained by the evapora- 
tion of sea water and of other natural brines, such as the water 
of the Caspian Sea, Great Salt Lake in Utah, and the Sal ton 
Lake of California. 



3°6 



ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY 




Strata of rock salt, left by the evaporation of ancient seas, sometimes 

1,000 feet thick, occur in the earth crust. The solid salt is sometimes 

mined like coal, but since it is 

frequently impure it is often 

cheaper to dissolve the salt 

in water and evaporate the 

brine. There are famous salt 

mines in Poland, Germany, 

Roumania, Spain, England, 

New York, and Louisiana. 

Salt is used almost universally 

as a food and as a preservative. 

It is also the source from 

which many compounds are 

manufactured, among which 
Fig. 283. -Salt works, France. soda agh) used ^ mak]ng 

soap, glass, and baking powder, is the most important. 

Sulphur is often obtained from volcanic regions, where it sublimes from the 
hot rock, and by roasting pyrite, a mineral common in coal mines. Sicily, 
Louisiana, and Japan are the chief sources. It is one of the most important 
of chemicals, indispensable in the manufacture of matches, gunpowder, and 
vulcanized rubber. The fumes of burning sulphur are a cheap and efficient 
bleaching agent and disinfectant. It is the basis of manufacture of sul- 
phuric acid and a long series of derivative compounds which rival in number 
and variety of uses those derived from common salt. 

Pigments. — Substances used to give color to paint are in some cases 
natural minerals and in others artificial products. The ochres are yellow, 
brown, and red compounds of iron, both natural and artificial. White lead, 
red lead, litharge, and chrome yellow are made from lead, zinc white from 
zinc, vermilion from mercury, and chrome red from chromium. 

Oils. — There are many vegetable oils in use for food for 
men and animals, for soap and candle making, lubrication, 
illumination, and dressing skins. Olive oil is the most valuable 
and takes the place of animal fat and flesh in the Mediterranean 
countries. Palm and coconut oil are products of tropical re- 
gions, and cottonseed and maize oils of temperate. The most 
important animal fats and oils are lard from hogs and tallow 
from cattle and sheep, used for food and for making soap and 
candles. Oil is obtained from the menhaden fish, and the whale 






CLOTHING AND CONSTRUCTIVE MATERIALS 307 

fishery was once the chief source of illuminating oils. Right 
whales are now nearly exterminated. Soap is made from vege- 
table and animal fats by boiling them with lye (caustic soda 
or caustic potash). Glycerin is a by-product. 

Essential Oils are not fats, will not make soap, and are soluble in water. 
They are distilled from various plants and are in common use as medicines 
and flavoring extracts. Camphor is the only solid essential oil, and is 
obtained entirely from the Japanese island of Formosa. Oil of pepper- 
mint, lemon, vanilla, wintergreen, sassafras, bitter almonds, anise, cloves, 
and many others are well known. 

Resins and Gums. — Resins and gums are vegetable products 
used in making soap, paint, varnish, and mucilage. Crude tur- 
pentine from the hard pine tree is the most important. It is 
separated by distillation into spirits of turpentine, used for 
mixing paints, and rosin, an ingredient of many soaps. 

Gum arabic, from the savannas of Africa, is the base of mucilage. Copal, 
dammar, and lac, which is produced by an insect, make fine varnishes. 
Chicle, produced only in Yucatan and used only in the United States, 
forms the body of chewing gum. Amber is a fossil gum from the shores 
of the Baltic Sea, used for ornament and the mouthpieces of pipes. 

Dyestufifs. — Dyestuffs are mostly of vegetable origin. Indigo, madder, 
and logwood are the most important. The natural supply is now almost 
entirely superseded by artificial dyes, made in great variety from coal tar. 

The number of useful commodities, natural and artificial, has 
probably never been estimated, but would run into the tens of 
thousands. The number of kinds of articles procurable in any 
civilized town of 50,000 inhabitants, not including medicines, 
is not less than 1,000. 



CHAPTER XXI 



HEAT, LIGHT, AND POWER 



Heat. — The development of civilization is characterized not 
only by a vastly increased utilization of material resources, 
but no less by growing dependence upon immaterial resources, 
especially heat, light, and power. The discovery of the use of 
fire, at first accidental from lightning or a volcano, was a step 
second in importance to none in the rise of man. 

The invention of methods for kindling fire when wanted has exercised 
a marked influence upon human progress. The savage rubs two sticks 

together until they ignite, — 
a thing not easy to do. Our 
ancestors of only a century 
ago depended upon sparks 
struck by flint and steel, 
while with us lucifer matches 
are the cheapest and most 
abundant of devices. While 
artificial heat is not needed 
for comfort in tropical re- 
gions, fire enables men to 
cook food, and this will al- 
ways be its prime function. 
The use of fire to maintain 
bodily temperature became 
necessary as men migrated 
into higher latitudes and al- 
titudes. The burning of brick 
and pottery, the smelting of 
ores, the working of metals, 
and the manufacture of glass require the highest temperatures attainable 
by the use of fuel. Some modern industries, such as the extraction of 
aluminum, are made possible only by the electric arc at 6,ooo°. 

308 




Fig. 284. — Savage kindling a fire. 






HEAT, LIGHT, AND POWER. 309 

Light. — Artificial light is an unappreciated luxury. Julius 
Caesar wrote his Commentaries by the light of a dull, smoky 
lamp, made by dipping a loose wick in an open dish of oil. 
In the Middle Ages houses and streets were lighted with flar- 
ing torches made by burning various combustibles in an iron 
basket. In the height of the whale-fishing industry sperm-oil 
lamps gave a brilliant light, but were costly and unsafe. Within 
the memory of men now living the common people had no better 
illuminant than a pine knot ora" tallow dip " candle. It was 
not until the latter half of the nineteenth century that the dis- 
covery of petroleum gave to everybody a cheap and efficient 
light. Coal gas has been used in cities for lighting about a 
century, and now electricity turns night into day. 

Power. — The ultimate source of nearly all the power avail- 
able for doing work on the earth is insolation, or radiant energy 
from the sun. Sunlight makes plants grow, and vegetation is 
the source of food which gives animals strength, and of fuel 
which, when burned, may run a heat engine. The sun heats 
different parts of the atmosphere unequally and thus makes the 
wind blow. The sun evaporates water from the sea, which, 
falling as rain on land, runs off in streams which furnish water 
power. 

Man Power. — Primitive man was dependent upon his own 
muscles. He traveled and used implements and weapons, but 
he did not travel fast, build large structures, or transport much 
freight. He had only two legs and two arms, both weak and 
short, and with them alone he could not rise above savagery. 
Human power and labor is still indispensable and always will be. 

The greatest amount of human labor is employed in the most advanced 
industrial communities. It has often been thought that machines would 
do away with human labor, but they generally increase the number of per- 
sons that can find employment and the total amount of muscular energy 
expended. This is true in manufacturing industries and transportation. 
Agriculture seems, so far, to be an exception to the rule. The use of 
agricultural machinery reduces the number of laborers employed, and exclu- 
sively rural districts are decreasing in population. This may be a tern- 



310 ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY 

porary phase, to be followed by the reverse as agriculture becomes more 
scientific and intensive. 

Labor Supply. — The problem of obtaining a sufficient supply of un- 
skilled human labor is one of the most serious which confronts the civilized 
world to-day. For the most rapid advancement labor should be plentiful, 
but the supply probably never will equal the demand. Facilities for cheap 
transportation render possible a circulation of labor, the people of those 
countries which have a surplus migrating to those which have a deficiency. 
Indian coolies are transported to South Africa to work in the gold mines, 
and Jamaica negroes to Panama to dig the canal. Three hundred thou- 
sand Italians come to the United States in a single year, one third of whom 
return to Italy sooner or later. Thousands cross the sea to work in Amer- 
ica during the season or as long as the job lasts, and go back home when 
business is dull. The United States, Canada, Australia, and South Africa, 
young and growing countries, need the largest supply of unskilled labor. 
Great Britain, France, and Germany are now self-sufficing, and Spain, Por- 
tugal, Italy, Austria, and Hungary have a surplus ; but as these countries 
develop they will not continue in such a condition. Russia, the Balkan 
countries, India, China, the East and West Indies, and north and central 
Africa have a large surplus of labor. The African supply increases under 
civilized control, and the abolition of war and slavery ; but the people often 
lack efficiency, are difficult to control, are unaccustomed to manual labor, 
and have a high death rate. These defects are characteristic of the natives 
of tropical countries generally. The people of northern India are industrious 
and of good physique, but race and religious prejudices, and sensitiveness 
to climate interfere with their transference to other countries. The people 
of south and Asiatic Russia, the Balkan states, and the Turkish Empire are 
semi-European, but rather unintelligent. The Chinaman is docile, peace- 
able, hardy, easy to feed, and of high efficiency. He does not assimilate with 
other peoples, and the white man's prejudice against him is so strong that 
h? is excluded by law from the United States and Australia, where a large 
supply of labor is most needed. 

Animal Power. — Domestic animals lifted men out of savagery. 
America remained barbarous for centuries largely because of the 
lack of domestic animals. Many of the larger animals are used 
more or less for power, but the horse is the most generally efficient. 
The early civilization of Eurasia was largely the result of horse 
power used for mobility and transportation. The horse survives 
the introduction of mechanical and chemical power in agri- 



HEAT, LIGHT, AND POWER 



3" 



culture, trade, and war, but his importance is relatively de- 
clining. The time may come when he will be excluded from 
cities and used more for pleasure than for business. 

Wind Power. — There is no lack of wind power in any part 
of the world except the calm belts, and it is inexhaustible. 
Until a century ago all large 
vessels were propelled by the 
wind, and sailing vessels still 
comprise about one eighth of 
the world's shipping. Wind 
power is used in Holland and 
the United States in small 
units for pumping water and 
grinding grain. Its use is re- 
stricted only by its incon- 
stancy. If means are ever 
devised by which power can 
be cheaply stored for use 
during a calm, the wind may 
yet drive the machinery and 
do the work of the world. 

Fuel. — The use of power from sun heat stored in vegetable 
matter was made possible by the invention of the steam engine, 
which is really a heat engine. It was first made practical by 
Watt, about 1770, and was successfully applied to vessels by Ful- 
ton, in 1807, and to land locomotives by Stephenson between 1815 
and 1830. The importance of its effects cannot be calculated. 
By it man's legs and arms have been multiplied, lengthened, 
and strengthened enormously. It has made world commerce 
and world power possible. For all practical, human purposes, 
it has reduced the size of the earth to about one tenth its 
former dimensions, and has correspondingly promoted the unity 
of mankind, making all men neighbors. 

Wood has always been the fuel most used for domestic purposes, and 
the boilers of the first steam engines were heated with wood. While forests 




Fig. 285. — Windmill, Holland. 



312 



ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY 



are more valuable for construction than for fuel, the world's supply of 
wood of little value for anything else than to burn is very large. 

Peat. — When vegetable matter decays under water it is converted into 
a brown or black, spongy mass, called peat, muck, or turf. A cool, moist 
climate is most favorable for its formation, and it has accumulated in the 
glacial lake beds and bogs of northern Europe and America in large but 
unmeasured quantities. When dried it forms as good fuel as wood, and 
in countries where coal and wood are scarce peat is in common use. It is 
sometimes pressed by machinery into briquettes and used for industrial 
purposes. Russia, Germany, Sweden, Denmark, Holland, and Ireland are 
peat-using countries. 

Coal. — Coal is fossil fuel, the concentrated residue of a 
luxuriant vegetation which flourished millions of years ago. It 

was first converted into peat, 
then buried under accumula- 
tions of sediment, and trans- 
formed by heat and pressure 
into coal. Lignite, or brown 
coal, has been changed so 
little as to retain the appear- 
ance of wood, and has about 
half the fuel value of the best 
coal. Very extensive beds of 
lignite exist in the United 
States and other countries, 
but are as yet little used. 
Bituminous or soft coal, con- 
Fig. 286. -coal mine. taining from 60 to 85 per 

cent of carbon, is widely distributed, and the world's main re- 
liance for industrial fuel. Large quantities are converted by 
heating into coke, which resembles anthracite. It is also the 
source of illuminating gas. Anthracite or hard coal contains 
from 85 to 98 per cent of carbon, and is of the highest value 
for most purposes. The area of the coal fields of the world is 
estimated at 650,000 square miles, of which two fifths belong to 
the United States and one third to China. 







HEAT, LIGHT, AND POWER 



313 



The yield of coal per square mile is very variable, the seams in some 
areas being few and thin, and in others numerous and thick. Coal is 
mined in England to a depth of over half a mile. The world's output is 
about 1,300 million tons annually, of which the United States mines nearly 
one half and Great Britain one fifth. About half of it is used for power 
purposes. Coal and iron form the basis of modern industrial civilization. 
In the production and consumption of both these articles per capita, the 
United States, Great Britain, and Belgium are, in that order, the leading 
countries, with France and Germany also ranking high. 




Fig. 287. — Coal-producing regions. 



The British coal fields are small in area but very rich, and 
have been the chief source of British wealth and sea power. 
In the fourteenth century the use of coal in England was pro- 
hibited by law on account of supposed injury to health. Now 
ten millions of people are living in British coal fields to make 
use of it. The anthracite or " smokeless coal " of south Wales 
is used for war. vessels, and for smelting ores sent from distant 
lands for that purpose. 

The exhaustion of the British coal supply in the near future is a serious 
question. The present century may see it so far reduced as to render 
British competition with manufacturers elsewhere difficult or impossible. 
On the continent of Europe coal of generally medium or inferior quality 
exists in strips and patches from Belgium to the Black Sea. The coal 
fields of China are very large and rich, but as yet wholly undeveloped. 



3 X 4 



ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY 



The southern continents are poorly supplied with coal, Australia being 
most highly favored. While coal occurs in all lands from Greenland to 
Antarctica, North America perhaps contains as much coal as all the rest of 
the world. The principal coal fields are (i) the Appalachian, from Nova 
Scotia to Alabama; (2) the Interior, from Ohio to Kansas and from Texas 
to Alberta; and (3) the Pacific, from Washington to Alaska. Anthracite is 
confined to eastern Pennsylvania and a few patches in the Rocky Moun- 
tains. On account of easily available coal and iron, great manufacturing 
industries have grown up around Pittsburgh, Cleveland, and Chicago, and 
the urban industrial and commercial district of the Atlantic seaboard is 
near the coal fields. The remarkable development of railroads in the 
United States and Canada is largely due to the wide distribution of coal. 
The consumption of coal in the United States nearly doubled in the ten 
years from 1900 to 1910. No coal is being formed in the earth at the 
present time, and the supply cannot be anywhere inexhaustible. At the 
present rate of increase of consumption, the world's store may be used 
up in 500 or 1,000 years. Its duration will probably be prolonged by the 
increased use of other sources of power. 

Petroleum. — Rock oil is a product of the natural decompo- 
sition of organic matter in deep-seated strata of the earth crust, 




Fig. 288. — Oil wells and tanks, Russia. (Robin.) 



and is obtained from wells. It is not found in the same strata 
with coal. Of the 460 million barrels consumed annually, the 
United States produces nearly two thirds, the Caspian field in 
Russia about one sixth, and Mexico about one eighth. 



HEAT, LIGHT, AND POWER 315 

Oklahoma, California, Illinois, Texas, Kansas, West Virginia, and 
Louisiana are important oil-producing states. Much oil is pumped through 
underground pipe lines to refineries at Cleveland, Toledo, and Whiting, 
Ind., and to the Atlantic coast cities. Petroleum is used in its crude form 
as fuel for engines, but it is refined by distillation into a large number of 
products, the most important of which are kerosene, gasoline, lubricating 
oils, and paraffin. Kerosene is the cheapest and most efficient illuminant 
the world has ever known. Gasoline has recently attained prime impor- 
tance for power by the development of the internal-combustion or gas 
engine, which is especially adapted for small units, and is displacing the 
steam engine for many purposes. As a liquid fuel easily converted into a 
gas it has no rival except alcohol. 

Natural Gas. — Gas is the most convenient form of fuel, and 
a cheap and abundant supply of it is of great value. Gas made 
artificially by heating coal has long been used for lighting and 
cooking, but its cost precludes its general use. Natural gas, 
produced by the distillation of organic matter in the earth 
crust, is of general occurrence in connection with petroleum. 

Burning springs have attracted attention in many countries since the 
earliest times. Those on the shores of the Caspian Sea have been objects 
of veneration by the Persian fire worshipers since a period before the 
Christian era. About 1886 gas began to be obtained in large quantities 
from wells in Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Indiana, and used for lighting, 
heating, and industrial purposes. It was conducted in pipes to towns 
within 200 miles of the wells, and the " gas belt " became a busy manu- 
facturing region, especially of those articles requiring high temperatures, 
such as glass, tin plate, brick, pottery, and steel specialties. West Vir- 
ginia, Illinois, and Kansas also became prominent gas-producing states. 
In some cases half the gas was wasted, and the supply for manufacturing 
and general heating was practically exhausted in about twenty years. West 
Virginia, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Oklahoma are now leading gas-producing 
states. 

Explosives. — Gunpowder, giant powder, nitroglycerin, dynamite, cordite, 
and other high explosives are fuels which burn rapidly and suddenly liberate 
large volumes of gas, and are used in hunting, war, and blasting rock. 

Water Power. — The power of water to drive machinery is 
proportional to the quantity and the head or height of fall. 
Natural cataracts in large streams furnish most power, but are 



316 



ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY 



not always most available. Dams are constructed to concen- 
trate the fall at one place and to store water, and are most 

efficient in streams of 
steep slope and narrow 
valleys, like those of New 
England. Good water 
powers are abundant in 
mountainous regions, re- 
mote from centers of pop- 
ulation, but the develop- 





~n ar 

"Tail JftUer 



Fig. 289. — Water wheel, Georgia. 

ment of electrical science has made 
such power more available. 

Electricity is not a source of power, but a ^g^gggg^:- 
convenient form in which power can be dis- 
tributed. The Cars of city and intemrban ^oo-- Arrangement of hydro- 
J electric machinery at Niagara 

lines are run by electricity generated at one Falls. 

or more power stations and transmitted over 

copper wires. Water power is used to generate electricity, which is used 

to do work at places sometimes 200 miles distant. The greatest source of 

hydro-electric power now in use is Niagara Falls (pp. 93, 94, 101). As coal 

becomes more scarce and costly, mountainous countries, such as Italy, 



HEAT, LIGHT, AND POWER 317 

Switzerland, and Norway, will become, by the use of water power, or 
" white coal," important centers of industry. 

Wave and Tidal Power. — The movement of waves and the rise and 
fall of tides are possible sources of power, but on account of inconvenience 
and uncertainty they are little used. 

Metals. — Some metals, chiefly zinc, iron, lead, and copper, are used 
in electric batteries to generate power for special purposes, but are too 
costly for use on a large scale. Radium and the group of allied metals 
recently discovered are capable of liberating enormous quantities of power. ' 
They are now extremely rare and costly, but suggest interesting possibili- 
ties for the future. 

Solar and Terrestrial Heat. — To contrive a system of 
lenses and mirrors by which the direct rays of the sun may be 
so concentrated as to become commercially available for heat, 
light, and power has been the dream of engineers, but has never 
yet been realized. The internal heat of the earth is second 
in quantity only to that received from the sun. If any means 
could be devised for utilizing it, it would be sufficient for human 
needs as long as the earth remains inhabitable. Perhaps the 
source of the power of the distant future will be in the nature 
of an artificial geyser or volcano. 



CHAPTER XXII 

MANUFACTURE, TRADE, AND TRANSPORTATION 

Manufacture. — Nearly all natural products must be more 
or less modified artificially to render them serviceable to man. 
In low stages of culture all of this, and in all stages much of it, 
is done literally by hand. With the progress of the industrial 
arts, a larger and larger portion is done by tools and machines, 
which are extensions and improvements of the human hand. 

In simple societies each family or group does this work for itself and 
at home. In more advanced and densely populated countries a division of 
labor arises by which an individual or family makes some special article 
at home for hire or for sale and exchange. Sometimes a traveling artisan 
goes from house to house to make shoes or clothes. These phases of 
domestic manufacture prevailed until the introduction of machinery and 
mechanical power. These made necessary the capitalistic or cooperative 
factory, in which an individual or company provides a large building 
equipped with machines and employs many operatives to work in it for 
wages. The distribution of hydro-electric power has brought about in 
some places and industries a partial return to domestic manufacture, in 
which individuals or small groups operate machines at home. 

Conditions of Manufacture. — To make any line of goods on 
a large scale with profit many conditions are necessary. Build- 
ings, machinery, power, heat, and raw materials must be sup- 
plied at the plant. A sufficient supply of skilled labor must 
exist in the immediate neighborhood. Since factory hands can 
produce little or no food, a sufficient food supply must be 
within reach. Lastly, the manufactured goods must be got to 
market. The location of a successful factory is determined by 
all of these conditions. 

If the raw material is bulky, it costs too much to transport it far, and 
it is manufactured near the supply. This is the case with sugar cane, 

3i8 



MANUFACTURE, TRADE, AND TRANSPORTATION 319 



from which the sugar is extracted on the plantation, but shipped long dis- 
tances to be refined. Grain is threshed on the farm, but may be sent any 
distance to a mill. South American hides are tanned in Massachusetts 
because capital, skilled labor, tanning materials, and a market for leather 
exist there more abundantly than in Argentina. The manufacture of 
cotton, wool, and silk is largely independent of the place 
of production of the raw fibers, and is carried on where 
power, skilled labor, capital, and markets combine to 
make it profitable. Half the cotton grown in the United 




Fig. 291. — Factories. Manchester, N. H. On the Merrimac River. 

States is sent to England to be made into cloth. The manufacture of iron 
and steel involves the use of very heavy materials — ore, coke, and lime- 
stone. It is carried on where the three can be brought together at least 
expense and the products find a ready market, as in the districts around 
Pittsburgh, Cleveland, and Chicago. The higher the value of the fin- 
ished goods the less dependent is their manufacture upon any conditions 
except skilled labor. The most general and potent control of the location 
of manufactures is transportation. Great seaports such as London and 
New York, and lake ports, river ports, and railroad centers such as Cleve- 
land, Chicago, Cincinnati, and St. Louis, attract all kinds of manufacture, 
because of the facility with which everything needed may be obtained and 
the goods sent to market. Great Britain is an example of the same thing 
on the largest scale. Having power, labor, and capital at home, by the pos- 
session of a vast merchant marine and a navy which commands the sea, 
the British people have grown rich by importing nearly all their food and 



320 ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY 

raw materials from the ends of the earth and sending their products to all 
the markets of the world. 

The United States is by far the greatest manufacturing coun- 
try in the world, the total value of its products amounting to 
20,000 million dollars annually. In respect to area it should be 
compared with all Europe, and in respect to population with Ger- 
many and Great Britain combined. Great Britain is second in 
value of total product, France third, and Germany fourth, but 
Belgium and Denmark each exceeds France and Germany in 
value per capita. 

Trade. — The most general fact learned from a study of 
physical and economic geography is that natural conditions and 
resources, and human life and culture, differ in different parts of 
the world. The differences, both in kind and degree, are almost 
innumerable. Differences in natural conditions — land, water, re- 
lief, soil, climate, and the rest — involve differences of resources, 
and these in turn determine occupations, products, and modes 
of human economy. It is the business of geography to study 
and explain the relationships which natural conditions and re- 
sources bear to human economies. 

Few if any countries can supply anywhere near all the products which 
its inhabitants want and can use. It would be futile to try to raise corn 
and cotton in England, sugar cane in Canada, or coffee and spices in the 
United States. Italy has no coal or gold, and Switzerland, Holland, Den- 
mark, and Ireland have no ores of any kind. Every community can fur- 
nish, raise, or manufacture some things to better advantage than others, 
and the community which undertakes to be independent and supply every- 
thing it needs, without help from other communities, will be obliged to 
limit its wants, which means a relatively low stage of culture and comfort. 
Out of these conditions arises trade, commerce, or the exchange of com- 
modities between different individuals, families, communities, and countries. 
Trade is the most complex and important of all the adaptations to his 
environment which man has accomplished. 

Transportation. — All trade depends upon the transportation 
of goods from one place to another, and has developed with the 
increase of facilities for transportation. Methods of transporter 



MANUFACTURE, TRADE, AND TRANSPORTATION 32 1 




Fig. 292. — Porters, China. 



tion are either animal or mechanical, or a combination of the 
two. 

Porterage. — The simplest form of transportation is porterage, 
in which loads are carried by men's hands and arms, or on their 
backs or heads. Although it is inefficient and expensive, it in- 
creases in amount with the 
increase of trade. The initial 
and the final movement of 
goods will always be chiefly 
by hand, as coal is shoveled 
into the car in the mine and 
into the furnace in the house. 

Porterage prevails among sav- 
age peoples, in tropical forests and 
savannas, and in mountainous 
countries. Among the North 
American Indians the men killed the game, while the squaws brought in the 
meat, and carried the tents, utensils, and babies on their backs. In central 
Africa negro porters are the chief reliance. About thirty men are required 

to carry a ton twenty-five miles a 
day, and they must be fed. The 
cost of transportation from the 
Guinea coast to Lake Chad, about 
600 miles, is $360 a ton. The cost 
on the Uganda railway for nearly 
the same distance is ten cents a 
ton. In the high Alps every peas- 
ant man, woman, and child carries 
a loaded basket fastened to the 
shoulders. 

Pack Animals. — Animals 
are a great improvement on 
the human porter, and the 
dog, ass, mule, horse, ox, 
camel, and elephant are all used as beasts of burden (Figs. 256, 
293). Probably the camel is the most efficient, carrying a load 
up to 1,000 pounds. Caravans of 13,000 camels, carrying goods 




Fig. 293. — Loaded camels, Egypt. 



322 



ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY 



of a total value of $800,000, cross the Sahara, occupying two 
years for a round trip. 

Vehicles. — Vehicles propelled by man or animal power are 
the first and simplest of mechanical aids to transportation. 

The North American Indians 
used the travois, consisting of two 
poles fastened to a dog's or horse's 
back with ends dragging on the 
ground. Cross pieces furnished a 
bed for carrying a load. The in- 
vention of the wheel was a great 
step in advance, and led to the 
development of innumerable vehi- 
cles, from the Chinese wheelbar- 
row to the railroad car and the 

Fig. 294. — Straw-covered bullock cart, Ceylon. , . 1 

Roads. — The use of wheeled vehicles renders necessary the 
construction of roads, of which the modern railroad is the 





Fig. 295. — St. Gothard coach road, Switzerland. 

most highly perfected. An ideal road must be smooth, hard, 
and level. These conditions are more or less fully obtained by 






MANUFACTURE, TRADE, AND TRANSPORTATION 



3 2 3 



grading, or cutting down elevations and filling depressions to 
reduce the slope as much as possible, and by surfacing the road 
with wood, gravel, stone, brick, asphalt, cement, or steel. Rivers 
and straits are crossed 
by bridges or tunnels. 
Mountain barriers are 
overcome by long de- 
tours, loops, and zigzags 
to lengthen the line and 
reduce the slope, and 
often by a tunnel at the 
summit (Figs. 295, 296). 
The Forth bridge in Scot- 
land, the East River bridges Fig 296 ._ Mouth of t^^ st . Gothard railway . 
at New York, the bridge 

across the St. Lawrence at Quebec, and several across the Mississippi 
are among the largest and most costly structures erected by man. Even 
these are surpassed in magnitude and difficulty of engineering by the Mt. 





Fig. 297. — Forth bridge, Scotland. 

Cenis, St. Gothard, and Simplon tunnels in the Alps and the Hudson River 
tunnels at New York. A tunnel under the English Channel is seriously 



3 2 4 



ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY 



planned, and one under Bering Strait proposed. The Rocky Mountains 
and the Alps are crossed by many railroads, and the Andes by one. 

The railway mileage of the world is over 600,000 miles, of 
which North America has nearly one half and Europe one 
third. The network of railroads is much more dense in eastern 
United States and western Europe than elsewhere. Belgium 
and the Netherlands have the greatest density, or the largest 
mileage per square mile of area. The longest and most numer- 
ous railroad lines extend east and west. Ten transcontinental 
lines cross North America and one crosses northern Eurasia. 
A north-south " pan-American " line from Canada to Argentina, 
and a " Cape to Cairo " line in Africa are probabilities of the 
near future. The development of the gas engine and the auto- 
mobile has given a new impetus to road construction for vehicles 
of moderate size. 

Water Transportation. — Transportation by water is easier 
and cheaper than by land. Its advantages are that water 
surfaces are level, or, in the case of navigable rivers, have a 
gentle slope. There is generally no expense for construction 

and maintenance, friction 
and resistance are small, 
the vehicles may be very 
large, and the power re- 
quired for a given load is 
less than on land. 

Boats of many kinds are 
in use, from the single log or 
raft, inflated oxhide, dugout, 
canoe, and rowboat to the 
modern steamship of 40,000 
tons burden, steaming 600 miles a day and burning a ton of coal per mile. 
The growth of ocean trade has led to the construction of ship canals, of 
which the Suez and the Panama are the most important (pp. 158, 159). 
The Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by important peoples, is most used. The 
Indian is a connecting link between the Atlantic and the Pacific, and the 
Pacific is the ocean of the future. Half the ocean commerce of the world 




Fig. 298. — Dugout, with outriggers, Philippines. 



MANUFACTURE, TRADE, AND TRANSPORTATION 325 

is carried on between Europe and North America, one eighth between 
Europe and the Orient and Australia (Suez route), and one eighth between 
Europe and Africa. 

The St. Lawrence River, with its connecting lakes and canals, furnishes 
the greatest inland waterway. The great possibilities of the Amazon and 
the Kongo are as yet little utilized. The Mississippi may regain the trade 
lost for want of improvement. The civilized world has entered upon an 
era of water transportation, and the development of waterways is one of 
the great economic problems of the twentieth century. 




Fig. 299. — Ocean steamer : the Olympic. 



World Trade. — The larger part of the world's trade is domes- 
tic, consisting of an exchange of goods between the different 
parts of the same country. It is impossible to estimate its 
total amount. Of foreign commerce, or the exchange of goods 
between different countries, an account can be made with con- 
siderable accuracy. The value of all the goods exchanged be- 
tween nations is about 50,000 million dollars annually, of which 
the trade of Europe is more than half. Among nations the 
United States leads with 17 per cent, and is followed by Great 
Britain with 14 per cent, France with 12 per cent, and Germany 
with 9 per cent. The little countries of Switzerland, the Nether- 
lands, and Belgium have the largest foreign commerce in pro- 
portion to population. 

In trade there are two great movements, one in a north- 



326 ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY 

south direction between the temperate regions and the tropics, 
and one in an east-west direction between temperate countries 
in different stages of development. At present the east-west 
movement is greater, but it may not always remain so. 

The present supremacy of the temperate zone, due to coolness and health- 
fulness, may, by the control of disease and the use of artificial refrigeration, 
pass to the tropics. Men may devise means of keeping cool in the torrid 
zone as they have of keeping warm in the frigid. Power and raw materials 
are plentiful in tropical regions, and centers of industry and population 
may shift toward the equator. 

Summary. — Every natural resource has existed upon the 
earth since the first appearance of man, and no natural resource 
has yet been fully utilized. Probably natural resources exist 
of which mankind is still ignorant. Every human want, art, 
and economy had its simple beginnings in the lowest stages 
of savagery and has persisted through all stages of culture. 
As each want, art, and economy developed, it has influenced 
more and more every other. The development of civilization 
and scientific economy has not released men from dependence 
upon natural resources, but only multiplied the number and 
increased the complexity of such relations. Modern industrial 
civilization is as truly based upon grass, trees, coal, iron, and 
copper as Eskimo life upon snow, seals, and walrus. 

The most favored countries possess lands in all climates, 
from tropical to cold temperate; of varied rainfall, relief, soil, 
and mineral wealth, and accessible to the sea. In all these 
respects the United States approaches ideal conditions. France 
equals or surpasses it on a small scale. Russia lacks only sea- 
coast. China, Australia, and Argentina have a hopeful future. 
Most of the European states and Japan are less favored, but 
may extend their territories and supplement their resources by 
colonization. 

The geologist sees no reason to doubt that the earth is des- 
tined to remain habitable for a longer period in the future than 
it has been in the past. The human race is still in its infancy, 



MANUFACTURE, TRADE, AND TRANSPORTATION 327 

and is barely beginning to realize the possibilities of its earthly 
possessions. Man is yet to have his day, and his kingdom, in 
which he shall control the forces of nature and have dominion 
over the planet, is yet to come. 




Fig. 300. — Airplane. 



The art of aviation, greatly stimulated during the World War, 
has indefinite possibilities of usefulness in time of peace. The 
airplane and the dirigible balloon are in regular use for the 
transportation of passengers and mail. They may play a part 
not less important than the railroad and the steamship. The 
atmosphere may become as truly a part of the kingdom of man 
as the land and the sea. , 



NATURv 




328 



EVINCES 




TABLE OF NATURAL PROVINCES 

(For reference in connection with the map, Fig. 301, pages 
328-325. The page number in parenthesis after the name of 
each province refers to the description of the province in the 

text.) 

I. Intertropical Provinces. 

1. Amazon type. — Amazon (499), Kongo (505), Malay (504). 

2. Caribbean type. — Caribbean (493) , Indo-Chinese (503) , Madagas- 

car (507). 

3. Mexican type. — Mexican (489), Andean (498), Orinoco (498), 

Brazilian (497), Central African (506), Dekkan (501). 

II. Subtropical and Warm Temperate Provinces. 

4. Arizonan type. — Arizonan (391,400), Saharan (409), Peruvian 

(411), Kalahari (410), Central Australian (411). 

5. Califomian type. — Cahfornian (412), Mediterranean (467), 

Chilean (418), Cape (418), Southwest Australian (418). 

6. Plata type. — Plata (508), South African (509), Queensland (510). 

7. Floridan type. — Floridan (356), Chinese (481). 

III. Temperate and Intemperate Provinces. 

8. Oregon type. — Oregon (412), West European (425), New Zealand 

(5ii). 

9. Mississippian type. — Mississippian (356), Central European 

(453), Manchurian (481).. 
10. Interior type. — American Interior (391), Eurasian Interior (398), 
Patagonian (399). 

IV. Cold Temperate Provinces. 

n. Alaskan type. — -Alaskan (513), Norwegian (515), Southwest 
American (516). 

12. Canadian type. — Canadian (516), Siberian (519). 

V. Polar Provinces. 

13. Arctic type. — American Arctic (519), Eurasian Arctic (520). 

14. Greenland type. — Greenland (520), Antarctic (31, 523). 

330 



PART III. REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 



CHAPTER XXIII 
NATURAL PROVINCES 

Nearly the whole land surface of the earth is now divided into 
areas having definite boundaries, in each of which government 
and laws are uniform. These political divisions are called em- 
pires, kingdoms, states, provinces, and many other names. The 
location, extent, and boundaries of political divisions are shown 
upon a political map, which is generally colored to emphasize 
their distinctions. They are all conventional and artificial in 
the sense of being man-made and the products of human society. 

The face of the earth may also be divided into areas in each 
of which all the non-human conditions, such as structure, relief, 
climate, vegetation, and animal life are uniform. Such areas 
constitute natural divisions, as distinguished from artificial, and 
a map of them may be called a natural map. The maps in 
Part I of this book showing relief, structure, soils, temperature, 
pressure, winds, rainfall, climate, and plant and animal regions, 
are natural maps, each of which shows the distribution of one 
or two natural conditions. A' composite map made by printing 
upon one sheet all the natural maps of this book would be a 
practically complete and correct natural map, but would be too 
complex to be useful. 

It is more difficult to make a natural map than a political 
map. The boundaries of political divisions are definite and 
well known, They are recorded in treaties and laws made by 

331 



332 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

the various governments concerned, and in civilized countries 
are surveyed and marked by permanent monuments upon the 
ground. A political boundary is so sharp that by taking one 
step across it a person may pass abruptly and completely out 
of the jurisdiction of one government into that of another. On 
the other hand, natural conditions vary gradually, and in most 
cases insensibly from one place to another, and natural bounda- 
ries are often vague and uncertain. The shore line of the sea, 
where land and water meet, constitutes a definite boundary on 
opposite sides of which nearly all natural conditions are strongly 
contrasted. The largest and most definite of all natural prov- 
inces are the continental land masses, and next to them islands 
and peninsulas. On land the sharpest contrasts occur along 
lines of abrupt change in elevation, as where plains are bordered 
by mountains or by plateaus which rise with an abrupt slope. 

While the natural divisions of the face of the earth would 
remain the same if no human being lived upon it, they derive 
their greatest importance in geography from their relations to 
human affairs. If these are kept in mind, it is possible to map 
the earth into large regions, in each of which many, if not all, 
of the natural conditions are approximately uniform, and deter- 
mine its general character and possibilities for human habita- 
tion and utilization. From this point of view, some natural 
conditions are more important than others and may be used to 
divide the face of the earth into great natural provinces. The 
temperature belts shown in Fig. 164 record the efficiency of 
solar energy and show in a large way the vigor and quantity 
of life possible in different parts of the earth. Combined with 
rainfall regions (Figs. 185, 186, 187), they display more defi- 
nitely the factors of climate upon which life intimately depends 
(Fig. 188). The lines of equal temperature and rainfall which 
bound climatic regions are imperceptible upon the ground and 
can be located only by a long series of scientific observations. 
They represent averages and not actual conditions existing on 
any given day, and serve to locate belts of gradual transition 



NATURAL PROVINCES 333 

from one climate to another. Nevertheless they are indis- 
pensable in mapping natural regions. Differences of climate 
find concrete expression in vegetation, and the ordinary observer 
can see clearly the change from forest to grassland and from 
grassland to desert. Natural vegetation is a visible expression 
not only of climate, but of soil, relief, and drainage, and in turn 
determines actual and possible animal life, food supply, and 
most of the material resources which are not mineral. Position, 
structure, and relief introduce special modifications which 
affect accessibility, arability, mineral wealth, and available 
power. All these conditions determine the large possibilities of 
human life and civilization, and constitute the basis for the 
division of the land into natural and economic provinces, that 
is, into natural environments. 

Hardly any part of the face of the earth is unique and wholly 
unlike every other part. Therefore natural regions fall into 
groups of two or more which are very much alike. One region 
in each group may be taken as a type and representative of the 
whole group, and a thorough study of the type region renders un- 
necessary a detailed study of the other members of the group. 
When the type is known, the others may be thought of as sub- 
stantially similar. Thus natural geography may be made more 
simple than political geography, because natural divisions do 
not differ from one another so much as political divisions. The 
natural conditions in any region determine natural resources and 
products, and through them influence strongly the food, cloth- 
ing, implements, dwellings, occupations, trade, and economic 
affairs of the people who inhabit the region. 

Wherever one or more natural conditions prevail in an extreme 
degree, as in regions which are very hot, very cold, very wet, 
or very dry, in dense forests, extensive grasslands, or deserts, 
on lofty mountains or oceanic islands scarcely rising above the 
waves, human life is rigorously limited and controlled by nature, 
and men remain in a relatively low stage of culture. Whenever 
natural conditions are more varied and of medium intensity, 



334 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

as in the mixed forest and grassland of the temperate zones, 
men have a better chance and are able to control and utilize 
nature in a great variety of ways and to become civilized. By 
means of trade all the resources of the earth are made available, 
and economic life correspondingly complex. But it is no more 
possible to escape from the influence of natural environment 
than it is to get off the earth. The occupations of a community, 
the resources they make use of, the work they do, the kind of 
living they get, modify the habits, thoughts, and spirit of the 
people and help to determine their political, educational, and 
religious institutions. All these things combined constitute the 
degree of civilization of the community and determine its place 
in history and its present power, influence, and rank among the 
peoples of the world. To discover how and to what extent 
human life is related to natural environment is the main problem 
of geography. It has been expressed by Le Play in a simple 
formula which may be stated in various terms: 

Place > Work > People 

Region > Resources > Human life 

Environment — > Occupations > Institutions 

Natural Provinces. — On the map, Fig. 301, the land areas 
are divided into natural provinces or environments, each of 
which may be subdivided into minor regions for detailed study 
to any degree of thoroughness desired. These provinces are 
arranged in five classes approximately defined by the tem- 
perature belts of Fig. 164. The provinces in each class are 
grouped according to relief, climate,, and vegetation under two 
or more types. In most cases there is little room for uncertainty 
as to the type to which the province properly belongs. The 
exact boundaries and arrangement of the provinces are subject 
to modification according to individual judgment, and the 
scheme is not to be regarded as final. Perhaps in the future 
geographers may agree upon a definite plan for the division of 
the whole face of the earth, including the sea, into natural 
environments. 



NATURAL PROVINCES 335 

I. Intertropical Provinces. — Temperature always high and 
the range small. In the Intertropical provinces seasonal changes 
of temperature are less marked than those of rainfall, which, 
except on plateaus and protected lowlands, is above 60 inches, 
with excess, if any, in summer. The vegetation, according to 
rainfall, is either tropical rain and monsoon forests, or tropical 
dry forest and savanna. Among the economic products are 
coconut, sago, oil, and other palms, manioc, gums, bananas, 
cocoa, sugar cane, rice, spices, coffee, opium, cinchona, rubber, 
cotton, silk, cabinet woods, timber, dyestuffs, ivory, and pearls. 
Collective economy prevails, with hoe, garden, and planta- 
tion culture in favorable localities. Technical arts are poorly 
developed. 

The native peoples are, with few exceptions, savage or semi- 
civilized, of American, Ethiopian, Mongolian, and Malay races. 
The prevalence of malaria, dysentery, and other tropical dis- 
eases renders these provinces unsuitable as a permanent home 
for Caucasian peoples. These difficulties may be overcome, and 
" the tropics " may become the important lands of the future. 

Types 1 and 2 are oceanic lands, islands, and peninsulas in 
the equatorial calm belt or exposed to trade and monsoon winds 
from the ocean. Rainfall generally above 60 inches. Tropical 
rain and monsoon forests. 

1. Amazon Type. Equatorial with no dry season. — Ama- 
zon; Kongo; Malay. 

2. Caribbean Type. Tropical with dry season. — Caribbean; 
Indo-Chinese; Madagascar. 

Type 3 includes continental lands and tropical plateaus, which 
on account of elevation have a more or less temperate climate. 
Rainfall generally 20 to 60 inches. Tropical dry forest and 
savanna. 

3. Mexican Type. — Mexican; Andean; Orinoco; Brazilian; 
Central African; Dekkan. 



336 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

II. Subtropical and Warm Temperate Provinces. — Hot with 

a temperate season or temperate with a hot season. These prov- 
inces include the great continental deserts of the world, with 
adjacent grasslands, and only two provinces in which the rain- 
fall is more than moderate. 

Type 4 includes the continental deserts. Rainfall less than 
10 inches. The daily range of temperature far exceeds the 
annual. Vegetation absent or scanty and confined to drouth 
plants. The economic products are minerals, except in ground- 
water oases and valleys irrigated by streams which rise in neigh- 
boring rainy regions. Desert populations are sparse, generally 
nomadic and barbarous, and often piratical, parasitic, or tribu- 
tary to the watered districts. 

4. Arizonan Type. — Arizonan; Saharan; Peruvian; Kalahari; 
Central Australian. 

Types 5 and 6 are oceanic lands with small range of temperature 
and a rainfall of 20 to 60 inches. 

Lands of type 5 have dry summers, tropical dry forest, and poor 
grassland. The economic products are the olive, vine, fig, date, 
citrus and stone fruits, wheat, corn (maize), and silk. Goats 
take the place of cattle. Meat and dairy products are scarce. 
The equable temperature, clear skies, absence of storms, and 
dry, stimulating air render the cMmate sanitary and delightful. 
The Mediterranean province has been the center of a high 
civilization for many centuries. The other provinces are small 
and their civilized communities young. 

5. Calif ornian Type. — Calif ornian; Mediterranean; Chilean; 
Cape; Southwest Australian. 

Lands of type 6 have dry winters and are covered with prairie, 
steppe, and scrub, or a combination of them. The economic 
products are cereal grains, cattle, horses, sheep, wool, hides, and 
ostrich plumes. The natural resources are poorly developed. 
The population is sparse, and herding is the chief economy. 



NATURAL PROVINCES 337 

6. Plata Type. — Plata (pampas) ; South African (veldt) ; 
Queensland (bush). 

Type 7 has a rainfall near or above 60 inches and no dry season, 
supporting temperate rain and summer forests. The economic 
products are tropical fruits, rice, sugar cane, tea, cotton, and silk. 

7. Floridan Type. — Floridan; Chinese. 

III. Temperate and Intemperate Provinces. — Lands of types 
8 and 9 have mixed summer and coniferous forests and grass- 
land {prairie). The economic products are corn (maize), wheat, 
oats, rye, barley, root crops, sugar beet, fruits, berries, tobacco, 
swine, cattle, horses, sheep, flax, hemp, and timber. These 
provinces are the special domain of the cereal grains and of 
animals fed upon them, and are the chief food-producing regions 
of the world. They are rich in coal and iron, and the technical 
arts are highly developed. They are densely populated by the 
most highly civilized Caucasian peoples, except in Asia. 

Type 8 includes west coast lands with small range of tem- 
perature. All seasons are temperate, and the rainfall is 20 to 
100 inches, with excess in winter. 

8. Oregon Type. — Oregon; West European ; New Zealand. 

Type 9 includes the east coast and interior lowlands with a 
hot and a cold season and a large range of temperature. The 
rainfall is generally 20 to 60 inches, with excess in summer. 

9. Mississippian Type. — Mississippian ; Central European; 
Manchurian. 

Type 10 comprises interior continental highlands, with ex- 
treme range of temperature and a rainfall less than 20 inches. 
They are broken by lofty mountain ranges inclosing plateaus and 
basins near and below sea level. Some of them are the most 
barren and inhospitable deserts of the world. They are char- 
acterized by a vast expanse of steppe, in Eurasia the home of 
Mongolian nomad herdsmen for 3000 years. The North Ameri- 



338 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

can steppes are occupied by Caucasian ranchmen who are 
tributary to the more favored regions on either side. In South 
America the narrowness of the continent mitigates the extreme 
climatic conditions, but the steppes are as yet occupied only by 
barbarous native hunters and herdsmen. 

10. Interior Type. — American Interior; Eurasian Interior; 
Patagonian. 

IV. Cold Temperate Provinces. — Temperate with a cold 
season or cold with a temperate season. 

Type ii includes west coast oceanic highlands with low 
temperature, small range, and a perennial rainfall of 20 to 100 
inches. The numerous snow fields and glaciers are not due to 
cold winters, but to heavy snowfall and cool summers. The 
ice-free land is occupied by coniferous and temperate rain forests. 
The economic products are minerals, fish, and timber. The 
narrow coast lands are largely dependent upon the sea. The 
scenery is among the most magnificent in the world. 

11. Alaskan Type. — Alaskan; Norwegian; Southwest Amer- 
ican. 

Type 12 includes continental lowlands with very low winter 
temperatures and large range. The rainfall is 20 to 40 inches, 
including a heavy and persistent snowfall. They comprise the 
great belts of coniferous forest which stretch across the northern 
continents from ocean to ocean. The economic products are 
minerals, furs, and timber. The sparse population of American 
and Mongolian races is engaged in hunting and trapping. More 
or less temporary and shifting groups and communities of 
Caucasians invade these provinces for mining and lumbering 
purposes. 

12. Canadian Type. — Canadian; Siberian. 

V. Polar Provinces. — The temperature is always low. Pre- 
cipitation is less than 10 inches, and mostly in the form of snow. 
The economic products are the musk ox, reindeer, hare, polar 



NATURAL PROVINCES 339 

bear, fish, marine mammals, and birds. The population is very 
sparse and mostly of the Mongolian race. 

13. Arctic Type. Lowland tundras. — American Arctic; 
Eurasian Arctic. 

14. Greenland Type. Highland ice deserts. — Greenland; 
Antarctic. 

VI. Regions belonging to types determined by special condi- 
tions of relief, accessibility, arability, and mineral wealth. 

Alpine Type. — Mountain lands. 
Andean Type. — Tropical plateaus. 
Netherlands Type. — Delta lands. 
Italian Type. — Peninsular lands. 
British Type. — Continental islands. 
Hawaiian Type. — Oceanic islands. 
Egyptian Type. — Irrigated lands. 




The highlands above 21100 feet are shown in 
the buff tints, the lowlands in the green tints, 
. and the sea covering the continental sbelLin 
the light blue tint. 

ISO Longitude 110 "West 



340 



CHAPTER XXIV 
NORTH AMERICA — PHYSIOGRAPHIC PROVINCES 

The continent of North America, with its outlying islands, 
extends through more than seventy degrees of latitude, and is 
crossed by all the belts of climate. Its shores are washed by all 
the oceans of the northern hemisphere, and it presents to them 
a diversified coast line. Its surface is occupied by an assem- 
blage of land forms which include all varieties of structure, 
relief, soil, and mineral products. Its rivers and lakes are 
among the largest in the world. It would be difficult to name 
a plant or animal which could not find a congenial home in some 
part of it. More than half of it lies in those temperate middle 
latitudes which are most favorable for the existence of a high 
degree of civilization. Its position, extent, character, and com- 
plexity render it one of the most valuable assets of the human 
race. It constitutes by itself a world in which nothing essential 
for human welfare is lacking. All varieties of landscape and 
scenery exist upon a large scale. Much simpler in plan than 
Asia, and more complex than any of the other continents, it may 
be regarded as the typical continent. Its natural provinces 
belong to nearly every type, and each one is a fair specimen 
of its class. A detailed study of North America goes far toward 
an understanding of world geography. 

Physiographic Provinces and Regions. — The map (Fig. 302) 
divides North America into physiographic provinces and regions, 
based upon the structure and relief of the earth crust. 

The Laurentian Peneplain (Figs. 23, in, 197). — The north- 
eastern part of the continent is occupied by one of the oldest 
land areas on the globe. It is bordered on the southeast 
by the St. Lawrence River and Gulf, and on the southwest by 
a series of great lakes, Ontario, Huron, Superior, Winnipeg, 

34i 



342 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

Athabasca, Great Slave, and Great Bear. On the east it 
presents a high, fiord coast to the Atlantic. The eastern rim 
is broken by Hudson Strait, admitting the Atlantic waters to 
the shallow interior basin of Hudson Bay. Ages of weathering 
and stream erosion have removed the original cover of sedimen- 
tary strata and exposed a complex mass of coarsely crystalline 
rocks of varied and deformed structure. Severe and prolonged 
glaciation has swept these rocks nearly bare and rounded and 
polished their surface, leaving the harder ledges upstanding in 
hills and ridges of low relief, with irregular hollows between. 

The drainage divide between Hudson Bay and the St. Law- 
rence is a broad plateau between iooo and 2000 feet in elevation, 
rising toward the east, where mountains bordering the Labrador 
coast stand above 5000 feet. The glacial rock basins and drift- 
dammed valleys of the peneplain are occupied by unnumbered 
island-studded lakes, of which Mistassini and Abbitibi, draining 
to Hudson Bay, and Nipigon and St. John to the St. Lawrence, 
are the largest. The numerous rivers are short, tortuous, dis- 
orderly, and frequently interrupted by lakes and rapids. 

The Laurentian province is very rich in minerals, which have 
been developed only along the southern edge, where iron, silver, 
copper, and nickel are mined. 

The Greenland Plateau. — Greenland, the largest island in the world, 
is a broken-block plateau separated from the continent by a wide stretch 
of deep water. Most of its area is covered by an ice cap of unknown 
thickness, the surface of which rises in the south to a height of 9000 feet 
above the sea. A strip of bare, rocky land, 20 to 100 miles wide, borders 
the coast, and toward the northern extremity a considerable area is ice- 
free. The coast is almost everywhere high, precipitous, and broken by 
profound fiords, through which the inland ice drains to the sea. The 
rocks exposed are generally crystalline, but beds of good anthracite coal 
occur in some localities. Baffin Land, one of the largest islands in the 
world, and the smaller islands to the north resemble Greenland. 

The Appalachian Highland. — Another area of old land, sepa- 
rated from the Laurentian peneplain by the valley of the St. Law- 



NORTH AMERICA — PHYSIOGRAPHIC PROVINCES 343 

rence, extends from Newfoundland nearly to the Gulf of Mexico, 
a distance of about 2000 miles. As this land rose above the 
sea, the earth crust was thrown into numerous parallel folds, 
like those of a heavy rug slid sidewise on the floor. As the folds 
were compressed and thrust upon one another, the strata were 
broken and faulted. During the process of folding and faulting, 
and through the ages since elapsed, erosion has removed layers 
of rock many miles in thickness. The Mohawk-Hudson gap 
in New York cuts the highland completely into two contrasted 
regions. 

The New England Plateau. — Northeast of the Hudson gap the 
New England plateau occupies the space between the St. Law- 
rence and the Atlantic. Only small areas of sedimentary rock 
remain, chiefly around the margins, and the plateau resembles 
the Laurentian peneplain. Many knobs, knots, and ridges of 
crystalline rock stand above the general surface. The Adiron- 
dack Mountains of New York form a roughly circular knot 
with peaks above 5000 feet. The White Mountains of New 
Hampshire form the culminating point of the region, where 
Mt. Washington reaches the highest elevation in northeastern 
North America, 6279 feet. 

Newfoundland is a portion of the highland detached by the 
drowned valley of the lower St. Lawrence. It is traversed by 
parallel ridges rising to 2000 feet, and is prolonged far out to 
sea by the slightly submerged " banks." The peninsulas and 
bays of Newfoundland and Nova Scotia are expressions of the 
original crustal folds. The coast line of the New England 
plateau is broken by numerous fiords and bordered by islands, 
all on a small scale, but furnishing many good harbors. The 
surface is covered by a thin mantle of bouldery drift, with sandy 
outwash plains near the coast. Glacial lakes abound, and the 
streams generally have narrow valleys and a rapid fall, with 
drowned mouths. The Connecticut is the longest, and in its 
southern course traverses a wide valley. 

Valuable quarries of granite, slate, and marble are numerous, 



344 



REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 



and rich coal fields underlie Nova Scotia and New Brunswick. 
Iron is mined in Newfoundland. 

The Appalachian Mountains and Plateaus. — South of the 
Mohawk-Hudson gap, the highland consists of a central moun- 
tain belt flanked by a plateau on each side. The folding of the 
strata in the central belt gave rise to narrow bands of alter- 
nately harder and softer rocks, from which the agents of erosion 
have carved a series of parallel ridges and valleys (Figs. 44, 195). 




Fig- 303. —Appalachian ridges in Pennsylvania. 

The ridges have smooth, symmetrical slopes and even crests, 
and extend in a straight line ten or twenty miles like a wall. 
As one dies out another begins at one side, so that the ends 
overlap. They are sometimes curved or connected in a zigzag 
pattern. The easternmost ridge south of the Potomac River, 
called the Blue Ridge, is more massive than the others, and, 
together with the plateau which borders it, consists of old crystal- 
line rocks. The Blue Ridge is separated from the other ridges 
to the west of it by an unusually wide interval known as the 
Great Appalachian Valley. The ridges generally vary in eleva- 
tion between 1000 and 4000 feet, but near the southern end of 



NORTH AMERICA — PHYSIOGRAPHIC PROVINCES 345 

the Blue Ridge, a massive knot reaches in Mt. Mitchell a height 
of 67 1 1 feet, the highest point in eastern North America. The 
narrow Piedmont Plateau which lies between the Blue Ridge and 
the coastal plain is a southern extension of the New England 
plateau (Fig. 30). The belt of mountain ridges is bordered on 
the west by a prominent escarpment, which is the abrupt edge 
of the Appalachian Plateau (Figs. 78, 303). It is dissected by 
streams, and from the east has the appearance of a mountain 
range overtopping the others. Hence in New York it is called 
the Catskill Mountains, in Pennsylvania and Virginia the Alle- 
gheny Mountains, and in Kentucky and Tennessee the Cum- 
berland Mountains. The surface of the Appalachian Plateau 
slopes gently northwestward and merges into the interior plains. 
The strata which underlie it have been but slightly disturbed 
from a horizontal position, but near the escarpment have been 
deeply dissected by the tributaries of the Ohio River. 

In the north the Delaware, Susquehanna, and Potomac rivers 
rise in the western plateau and flow southeastward directly 
across the grain of the country, cutting narrow water gaps 
through all the ridges on their way to the Atlantic. The nu- 
merous gaps give access to the valleys and enable railroads and 
canals to cross the highland (Fig. 44) . In the south most of the 
streams rise in the Blue Ridge and flow northwestward. The 
Kanawha flows directly to the Ohio. The other mountain streams 
join the Tennessee, which makes its way out by a circuitous 
course to the Ohio near its mouth. 

The soils of the Appalachian mountains and plateaus vary 
with the kind of rock which underlies them. They are generally 
poor on the ridges and sandstone areas, and fertile in the valleys 
and on limestone areas. The mountains and western plateau 
contain the richest coal fields in North America, also petroleum 
and gas. Iron ore is extensively mined in Alabama. 

The Ozark Plateau. — An outlying portion of the Appalachian highland 
appears west of the Mississippi River in the Ozark plateau, which stands 
like an island in the interior plain, as Newfoundland stands in the ocean. 



346 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

The part north of the Arkansas River is a reproduction on a small scale of 
the Appalachian Plateau. South of the Arkansas, a belt of parallel ridges 
and valleys trending east and west, called the Ouachita Mountains, repro- 
duces in miniature the features of the Appalachian Mountains. 

The Cordilleras. — The western highland of North America, 
known as the Cordilleras, extends from southern Mexico to 
Bering Sea, and on the parallel of 40 N. Lat. is 1000 miles wide. 
It is divided longitudinally into three great provinces, the 
Rocky Mountains, the Intermont Plateaus, and the Pacific 
Ranges. 

The Rocky Mountains (Figs. 54, 58, 60, 74, 131, 198). — The 
Rocky Mountain system forms the eastern member of the Cor- 
dilleras and consists of a belt of folded and dissected ranges, 
with occasional volcanic peaks and knots. The scores of ranges 
composing the system present a great variety of structure which 
would require a volume to describe. The general arrangement 
is of parallel and overlapping ranges separated by high plateaus 
or valleys. In Canada there are two well-defined series divided 
by a trench which is continuous for 800 miles, and occupied 
alternately by the head waters of the Columbia, Fraser, and 
Mackenzie, which pass out on either side through water gaps. 
The Rocky Mountain system is broken in Wyoming by a basin 
about 200 miles in diameter and connected through a gap with 
the Great Plains on the east. North of this basin the Yellow- 
stone National Park includes a volcanic knot famous for its 
geysers and hot springs. The width of the system is generally 
not more than 100 miles, but in northern United States increases 
to 400 miles. The highest part of the system is in Colorado, " 
where Pikes Peak, Longs Peak, and about one hundred others 
rise to about 14,000 feet. A height of 10,000 feet or more is 
maintained as far north as the parallel of 6o° N. Lat. The 
system forms the great continental divide between streams 
flowing to the- Pacific on the west and to the Atlantic and Arctic 
on the east and north. As a system, the Rocky Mountains do not 
extend south of Colorado, but are continued by broken block 



NORTH AMERICA — PHYSIOGRAPHIC PROVINCES 347 

ridges which merge into the escarpment of the Mexican Plateau, 
known as the eastern Sierra Madre. 

The Rocky Mountains are rich in minerals and furnish a 
large part of the world's supply of gold, silver, copper, and lead. 
Passes practicable for railroads occur at intervals throughout 
the length of the system, which is crossed by ten or more trunk 
lines, with branches to the many mining regions. 

The Pacific Ranges (Figs. 40, 43, 51, 84, 104, 106). — The 
Pacific coast of North America is bordered by a double chain 
of mountains with a central longitudinal valley. The eastern 
member rivals the Rocky Mountains in height and continuity. 
The western Sierra Madre of Mexico is isolated by a wide gap 
on the north, through which the Colorado River passes. The 
Sierra Nevada of California is a single massive block uptilted 
on the east, where a steep escarpment faces the Great Basin 
with an unbroken wall. The highest point in its even crest 
line is Mt. Whitney, 15,000 feet. It is continued northward by 
the Cascade Range, chiefly of volcanic origin, of which Shasta, 
Hood, and Rainier or Tacoma are conspicuous and symmetrical 
cones about 14,000 feet high. The range is cut in two by the 
Columbia valley and ends at the Fraser River gap. North of 
the Fraser, the Coast Range of British Columbia and Alaska 
is deeply gashed by fiords and crossed by several small rivers. 
North of the parallel of 6o° N. Lat. the system curves to the 
west and expands into the Alaskan Mountains, a great volcanic 
knot which contains some of the highest peaks on the continent, 
McKinley (20,300 feet), Logan (19,500), St. Elias (18,000), 
Crillon (15,900), and Fairweather (15,300). Beyond the knot 
the system is prolonged through the Alaskan peninsula and 
Aleutian Islands by a chain of volcanoes, many of which are 
active. The Alaskan mountains are covered by extensive snow 
fields and their valleys filled with hundreds of glaciers, many of 
which reach the sea. 

They contain deposits of coal, gold, copper, and tin, the extent 
and value of which are very great, but not yet fully determined. 



348 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

The western member of the Pacific mountain system is older 
and far less massive than the eastern, and north of the Strait 
of Fuca is broken into a chain of islands. The southern ex- 
tremity forms the backbone of the peninsula of Lower Califor- 
nia, between which and the mainland lies the rift valley of the 
Gulf of California. The Coast Ranges are separated from the 
Sierra Nevada by the great Valley of California, and from the 
Cascade Range by the valleys of the Willamette River and Puget 
Sound. They are broken by San Francisco Bay and the lower 
Columbia River. Vancouver and other islands contain good 
coal beds. Mercury is mined south of San Francisco, and Lower 
California has considerable mineral wealth, as yet little developed. 

The Pacific coast of North America, from Panama to the 
Strait of Fuca, is generally high and smooth, with long lines of 
cliffs and a few small and shallow bays. There are no im- 
portant indentations except the Gulf of California, San Fran- 
cisco Bay, and the mouth of the Columbia. The northern part 
is still higher but broken by numerous fiords and canals, of which 
Lynn Canal and Puget Sound are the largest (Figs. 151, 333). 

The Intermont Plateaus. — The space between the Rocky 
Mountains and the Pacific ranges is occupied by a series of 
plateaus 4000 to 8000 feet in height. Extensive faulting and 
outflows of lava have occurred. The higher portions are dis- 
sected by canons. The intermont belt is divided at the parallel 
of 50 N. Lat., where the Rocky Mountains and the Pacific 
ranges come in contact. The southern portion is drained by 
the Rio Grande, Colorado, and Columbia, the northern chiefly 
by the Fraser and the Yukon. 

The Yukon Plateau. — In Canada and Alaska a rough and 
mountainous plateau, widening northwards, descends to the 
coast lands of Bering Sea. The northern half forms the basin 
of the Yukon, while the southern is drained by the Fraser and 
smaller streams which pass directly through the coast moun- 
tains to the Pacific. Rich gold fields occur on many of the 
rivers, among which the Klondike, Tanana, Atlin, Kluane, and 



NORTH AMERICA — PHYSIOGRAPHIC PROVINCES 349 

Skeena are most famous. The combined product of all these is 
nearly equaled by that of the field about Nome, south of Bering 
Strait. Coal beds occur at many places in the Yukon basin. 

The Columbia Plateau (Fig. 141). — An area of 200,000 square 
miles, mostly in Idaho, Washington, and Oregon, is covered 
by a series of lava sheets which in some places are more than 
4000 feet thick. The smooth surface of the lava meets the slopes 
of older mountains as the surface of the sea joins a rugged 
coast. It extends up the valleys and indentations and is itself 
indented by projecting headlands, while some mountains are 
completely surrounded and form islands in a frozen sea of lava. 
In some places it has been extensively eroded by streams, and 
in others broken by faulting into blocks, as in the block moun- 
tains of Oregon. It is traversed by the Snake River, which 
flows through a canon in some places 4000 feet deep. Much 
of the drainage is subterranean, leaving the surface unscarred 
by stream valleys. The soil is generally scanty, but local 
accumulations are of great thickness and very productive. 

The Great Basin. — Between the Sierra Nevada and Wasatch 
Mountains an area of 210,000 square miles, extending from 
4i|° N. Lat. nearly to the Gulf of California, has, on account of 
scanty rainfall, no drainage to the sea, and is hence called the 
Great Basin. Its elevation of 4000 to 6000 feet makes it a 
typical intermont plateau. It is traversed by numerous north- 
south mountain ranges separated by flat-floored valleys, and 
its surface resembles that of a rasp. The ranges are of varied 
structure, some being the edges of broken blocks and some the 
remains of ancient folds. Nearly all of them have suffered 
extensive erosion. Infrequent but violent rains on the summits 
produce temporary torrents, which score the mountain sides 
and carry down sediment which accumulates in the valleys. 
The streams soon disappear by evaporation, and thus the moun- 
tains have been half buried in their own waste. There are 
many " sinks " and salt lakes, all of which are subject to great 
variations of volume and area and are liable to dry up entirely. 



35o 



REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 



The largest of these is Great Salt Lake in 
Utah, which is permanent but fluctuating in 
level and outline. Two depressions, Death 
Valley and the Salton Sink in California, 
have floors several hundred feet below sea 
level. Very rich gold-bearing veins have 
been discovered in the mountain ranges, and 
the lake basins contain deposits of salt, 

1 borax, and soda. The whole region is desert 
5 and its soils are largely eolian, but productive 
. wherever water is available for irrigation, as 
| in the valley of Great Salt Lake and others 

a near the foot of the mountains. 

o 

2 The Colorado Plateau (Figs. 38, 73, go, 
5 204, 205, 304). — Most of the area drained 
w by the Colorado River, including the Wasatch 
t Mountains, is a plateau above 6000 feet 

1 in elevation. It is bounded on the west 

2 by the fault scarp of the Wasatch, which 
j overlooks the Great Basin from a height of 
° 6000 to 10,000 feet. Sedimentary beds of 
I great thickness , have been denuded, leaving 
£ the edges of the harder layers upstanding in 
? long lines of cliffs which trend in a general 
§■ east-west direction, and divide the plateau 
m into a series of platforms rising by gigantic 

steps, like a tilted staircase. In the western 
part north-south faults have broken the strata 
into parallel blocks, bounded by escarpments 
at right angles to the other set. The struc- 
ture and surface are farther complicated by 
numerous volcanic cones, cisternlike intrusions 
and outflows of lava. Across this region the 
Green, Grand, and Colorado rivers, with their 
branches, flow with little regard to the surface slope, intrenched 



NORTH AMERICA — PHYSIOGRAPHIC PROVINCES 351 

in profound canons, of which the Grand Canon of the Colorado 
in Arizona is unrivaled in the world. The plateau is well 
characterized by the Indians as " the land of standing rocks." 
Important mineral deposits have so far been discovered only 
in the Wasatch Mountains; yet, on account of its magnificent 
scenery and the grand scale upon which physiographic forms 
and processes are displayed, the Colorado Plateau must be 
reckoned as one of the most valuable regions of the world. 

The Mexican Plateau (Figs. 191, 196). — The southernmost 
portion of the plateau belt rises from the depression of the Gila 
River to heights of 6000 to 8000 feet south of the tropic. It is 
an old valley between the ranges of the eastern and western 
Sierra Madre, which has been filled nearly brimful with an 
accumulation of waste from the mountains and the discharge 
from a great number of volcanic openings. In some places peaks 
and ridges of buried mountains project above the surface of the 
filling like islands from the sea. There are no large rivers, and 
the streams are generally torrents during one half the year and 
dry during the other half. Some of them end in sinks and salt 
lakes. It is one of the richest mining regions in the world, and 
contains unestimated stores of silver, gold, copper, lead, mercury, 
and iron. 

The Sonora Desert. — In a belt extending southward from the 
Great Basin to the Caribbean Ranges in Mexico and bordering 
the Gulf of California on the east, the rainfall is so scanty and 
irregular that the relief, drainage, and vegetation are those of 
a typical desert. (See pp. 136, 213, 218, 409 and Figs. 37, 305.) 
The peculiarities of this region are so strongly marked that it 
has been set apart as a distinct physiographic province under 
the name of the Sonora Desert. 

The Caribbean Ranges. — Southern Mexico, Central America, 
and the large islands of the West Indies (the Greater Antilles) 
are formed by partly submerged volcanic mountain ranges 
trending east and west, which with the northern Andes nearly 
inclose the deep basin of the Caribbean Sea. Volcanic cones, 



352 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

many of which are active, are numbered by scores, of which 
Orizaba (18,250), Popocatepetl (17,520), Ixtaccihuatl (17,000), 
and Toluca (15,000) in Mexico are the loftiest. The continental 
ranges are lowest at the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, now crossed 
by a railroad with a summit level of 700 feet, and at the narrow 
Isthmus of Panama, where there is a ship canal. 

The Interior Plains. — The interior of North America is occu- 
pied by a continuous plain from the Gulf of Mexico to the Arctic 
Ocean. Its length is more than 3000 miles, and its greatest 
width about 1200 miles. The northern part is broken into a 
group of ragged islands forming the Arctic Archipelago. The 
Arctic shore is bordered by a narrow strip of coastal plain, the 
Gulf shore by a wider one. The remainder, which is truly in- 
terior, may be divided into three principal regions. On the 
north the long, narrow trough of the Mackenzie Plain slopes 
from an elevation above 2000 feet at the foot of the Rocky 
Mountains, eastward and northward to sea level. The trunk 
stream is one of the great rivers of the continent, with a volume 
of water sufficient to make it navigable for more than 1000 miles, 
but except for a few months in the year it is choked with ice. 
The wider and utilizable part of the interior plains, south of 
55 N. Lat., is divided by differences of rainfall and vegetation, 
as well as of relief, into two contrasted portions. 

The Great Plains (Figs. 36, 94, 133, 134, 202, 253) slope from 
an elevation of 4000 or 5000 feet at the foot of the Rocky 
Mountains eastward about 300 miles to the 2000-foot contour 
line, and hence are technically a plateau. In places the eastern 
edge is marked by an escarpment, but generally the surface 
merges imperceptibly into the lower plains. A large part of 
the Great Plains appears to be as smooth and level as the sea, 
and distant objects are hidden, like ships, only by the curve of 
the earth. The monotony, however, is broken in the northern 
states by uplifts and protrusions of igneous rock, which in the 
case of the Black Hills attain the magnitude of mountains. The 
higher portions are deeply cut by stream valleys, and in some 



NORTH AMERICA — PHYSIOGRAPHIC PROVINCES 353 

localities carved into the fantastic and intricate forms of the 
" bad lands." Local areas of drifting sand dunes occur in west- 
ern Kansas and Nebraska. The large rivers rise in the Rocky 
Mountains and, fed by melting snows, meander through wide val- 
leys toward the Nelson and the Mississippi. Losing in volume 
of water by evaporation as they go, they are, except in times 
of flood, heavily loaded with sediment, and navigation, always 
difficult, is generally impossible for anything but small boats. 

The Central Lowland (Figs. 34, 35, 45, 47, 48, 112, 113, 114, 
115). — That part of the Interior plains extending from the 
lower Saskatchewan River approximately to the Missouri and 
Ohio, and including the basins of lakes Winnipeg, Michigan, 
Huron, Erie, and Ontario, is covered by a heavy mantle of 
glacial drift which has filled the depressions and obliterated 
most of the surface irregularities of the bed rock beneath. 
Only the large streams have been able to keep their original 
valleys open, and even the Missouri, Mississippi, and Ohio 
were diverted and displaced by the ice sheets which deposited 
the drift. The smaller streams are all young, and since the 
retreat of the ice have been unable to drain the innumerable 
lakes and marshes which occupy the hollows of the drift surface. 
The divides are low, flat, and difficult to locate. The only 
prominent features of relief are the bluffs which border the flood 
plains of the larger streams, and the belts of morainic hills which 
sweep in great loops and festoons with convex curves to the 
south and sharp reentrant angles to the north (Fig. 113). 

The glacial drift and bordering deposits of loess constitute 
soils of great fertility and endurance. 

The whole area of the Interior plains, with some local ex- 
ceptions, is underlain by sedimentary strata of great thickness 
which have been but little disturbed from their original hori- 
zontal position. They contain beds of coal and lignite second 
in value only to those of the Appalachian highland. Lead and 
zinc are mined in Missouri and Wisconsin, and the Black Hills 
contain rich veins of gold, silver, and lead. 



354 



REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 



The Coastal Plains (Figs. 28, 69, 136, 194). — The coast of 
the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic as far north as New York 
is bordered by a coastal plain of varying width. Long Island, 
Marthas Vineyard, Nantucket, and the Cape Cod peninsula are 
fragments of a former northward extension. South of the Rio 
Grande the plain is very narrow, but northward it extends up the 
Mississippi 600 miles to the mouth of the Ohio. On the Atlantic 



150° 140° 130' 120° 110° 100° 90° 80° 70° 60° 







Fig. 30s. 



NORTH AMERICA— PHYSIOGRAPHIC PROVINCES 355 

side the inner margin is the edge of the Piedmont Plateau, which 
forms a low escarpment, or Fall Line, where rapids or falls occur 
in all the streams crossing it. The larger rivers are invaded by 
the tide up to the Fall Line. The low, limestone peninsulas of 
Florida and Yucatan differ in structure from the rest of the 
plain. The drainage is chiefly subterranean, and in Florida 
numerous small sink-hole lakes occur. On the outer side the 
coast is bordered by the wide submerged plain of the continental 
shelf. The coast line is indented by many shallow bays and 
barred from the sea by extensive barrier beaches. The beaches 
of Florida are peculiar in being partly of coral formation. The 
delta and mouth of the Mississippi constitute the most impor- 
tant feature of the Gulf coast. Mineral deposits of value are 
generally absent. Beds of phosphate rock in Florida and South 
Carolina, and of salt and sulphur in Louisiana, and petroleum 
" pools " in Texas and Oklahoma form notable exceptions to 
this rule. 

The temperature, rainfall, climate, and vegetation of North 
America are described in Chapters XIII-XVI and shown on 
the maps, Figs. 158, 159, 160, 161, 162, 164, 165, 166, 185, 186, 
187, 188, 192, 305. 



CHAPTER XXV 

THE MISSISSIPPIAN AND FLORIDAN PROVINCES 

The natural provinces which occupy the middle latitudes 
of North America fall into three well-marked divisions of two 
each. The Atlantic division comprises the Mississippian and 
Floridan provinces, the Middle division the Interior and Ari- 
zonan provinces, and the Pacific division the Oregon and 
Californian provinces. 

The Atlantic Division. — The Mississippian and Floridan 
provinces constitute a well-defined natural and economic unit, 
the only important distinction between them being climatic. 
The Mississippian province belongs to the intemperate belt of 
hot summers and cold winters and has a rainfall between 20 and 
50 inches, while the Floridan is in the subtropical belt of hot 
summers and temperate winters and has a rainfall a little below 
or above 60 inches. There is no sharp line of demarcation 
between them. They are bounded on two sides by Atlantic 
waters, on the west by the line of 20 inches of rainfall and the 
borders of the steppe (Figs. 185, 192), and on the north approxi- 
mately by the July isotherm of 70 degrees and the margin of 
the Laurentian peneplain. They include the Appalachian High- 
land, except Newfoundland, the whole of the Central Lowland, 
nearly all of the Atlantic and Gulf coastal plain and a small 
portion of the Great Plains. The area is nearly 2,000,000 
square miles, or one fifth of North America. It is half as large 
as Europe and nearly two thirds as large as the United States. 
The population is about 90,000,000, or 70 per cent of the total 
population of North America. The density of population is 
about 45 per square mile. 

356 



MISSISSIPPIAN AND FLORIDAN PROVINCES 



357 



Importance. — This region is the most densely populated 
large area in the western hemisphere and the most important 




Fig. 306. 

center of civilization outside of Europe. The bordering Cana 
dian and Interior provinces are closely related and tributary 
to it. This preeminence is due to many causes, natural and 
historical. 

(1) Position. — It lies on the west side of the north Atlantic 
Ocean and north of the American Mediterranean. The long, 
low coast line, with many drowned valleys, and the number of 



358 



REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 



navigable waterways which penetrate the interior, render it 
easily accessible by water from the better half of the world. 

(2) Relief and Structure. — While its relief is sufficiently 
varied, not more than one tenth of it is too rugged for cultiva- 
tion. Four fifths of it is a smooth plain below 2000 feet in 
elevation, almost everywhere arable and traversable by roads 
and canals. Its crust includes the most valuable coal and 



^ 30 




Fig. 307. 



MISSISSIPPI AN AND FLORID AN PROVINCES 359 

petroleum fields yet developed in the world, with important 
deposits of iron, lead, zinc, and other minerals. Two fifths of 
its area is covered with the best of glacial soils. In the rougher 
parts water power is abundant. 

(3) Climate. — It lies in that part of the so-called temperate 
zone where the summers are long and warm enough to ripen the 
cereal grains and the rainfall in the growing season is everywhere 

' sufficient for agriculture. 

(4) Vegetation. — The natural vegetation includes large areas 
of coniferous and summer forests and prairie. The summer 
forests are easily converted by clearing into grass and agricultural 
lands. 

(5) People. — The bulk of the population is of Baltic Cauca- 
sian stock (p. 260), which the presence of negroes, descended 
from former slaves, and the recent influx of Alpine and Medi- 
terranean immigrants have not yet notably modified. In race 
and civilization the region is an oversea colony of western and 
central Europe. 

Aboriginal Inhabitants. — Aside from destroying patches of forest by 
fire and restricting to some extent the natural increase of wild animals, the 
Indians of this region played an insignificant part in its history. They 
had scarcely disturbed the balance of nature and were of less importance 
than trees and deer. It was substantially a virgin environment of con- 
tinental dimensions of the most favorable character, literally a new world, 
which civilized men discovered in the sixteenth century and finally gained 
possession of in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. The immi- 
grants brought with them every kind of domestic animal now kept in this 
region except the turkey (and some dogs), all the cereal grains except corn 
(maize), and all the other plants of great economic value except cotton and 
tobacco. Even the species of cotton now extensively grown in the Flori- 
dan province probably originated in India. The changed environment was 
stimulating and caused plants, animals, and men to develop new adapta- 
tions, which, in most cases, resulted in an increase of vigor and efficiency. 
The native species often proved inferior and gave way before the invaders. 
As the white man has swept aside the red man, so English timothy grass 
and clover have displaced native grasses, and most of our common weeds 
are of European origin. Corn, tobacco, the potato, and the turkey are 



360 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

the only important. American aborigines which have held their ground 
and increased and multiplied under foreign dominion. 

Agriculture 

Agriculture, combined with stock raising, extends over the 
whole area of the Atlantic provinces (Mississippian and Floridan) 
except the mountainous and dissected parts of the Appalachian 
highlands, and even there is of considerable importance in the 
valleys. It reaches its highest development on the Central 
Lowland. 

Fig. 306 shows the approximate length of the growing season, 
or period between frosts, which reaches ten months on the Gulf 
coast and is about four months in the extreme northwest. 
Fig. 186 shows that the seasonal distribution of rainfall is every- 
where favorable for agriculture. Where the annual rainfall is 
least, the maximum occurs in summer, and is sufficient for crops 
because evaporation is relatively small. The isotherms in sum- 
mer bend far northward (Fig. 159) in Alberta and Saskatchewan, 
and while the winter temperatures are considerably below zero, 
this is not a controlling factor in agriculture. All the natural 
conditions are nicely adjusted for the existence of a wide range 
of vegetation from the subtropical to the cold temperate. 

Corn. — Corn (maize) is grown throughout the Atlantic prov- 
inces, but is not an important crop in the region where the 
growing season is less than 4.5 months. The most productive 
corn belt lies in the southern part of the Central Lowland, 
from Ohio westward. The states included in this belt produce 
about 70 per cent of the total crop. This belt leads also in the 
production of all grains. 

Corn is planted in rows, usually in May, cultivated to kill weeds and keep 
the soil moist until half grown, and harvested in September and October. 
The stalks of ripe corn are taller and heavier than those of any other grain, 
and correspondingly difficult to handle. They are often cut with the stroke 
of a long knife and set up in shocks to cure (Figs. 242, 244). Many farmers 
pick the ripe ears from the stalks, which are left standing, and cattle are 



MISSISSIPPTAN AND FLORIDAN PROVINCES 



361 



turned into the field to eat as much as they will of the fodder; but such 
methods are wasteful. Machines are now in use which cut and bind the 
corn. After a month or more of curing in the shock, the ears are husked, 
largely by hand, the work being carried on through the late autumn in 
the field, and sometimes in barns during the winter. Machines are now 
in use, which, driven by a steam or gasoline engine, separate the ears 




Fig. 308. — Chief corn and wheat producing regions of the United States and Canada. 



and tear the stalks into shreds, rendering them more easily handled and 
consumed by stock. The ears are stored in cribs, or roofed pens open 
for circulation of air, and fed out to swine, cattle, and horses. Some por- 
tion of the grain is shelled and ground into meal or made into hominy, 
breakfast food, and other articles for human consumption. Corn cobs 
make excellent fuel for a quick, hot fire. 

The unripe grain of some varieties, while still soft and milky, known 
as green corn, is roasted or boiled for immediate use, or preserved in sealed 
cans. Unripe corn stalks and ears are cut and packed in large bins, or 
silos, so tightly as to exclude the air. In this condition the material does 
not spoil or decay, and furnishes green fodder much relished by cattle in 
winter. The corn-swine-cattle system furnishes one of the most complete 
and economical combinations of agriculture and stock raising known. A 
large yield of both bulky and concentrated food is utilized and converted 



362 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

into pork and beef or milk, while sufficient fertilizer is returned to the land 
to prevent 'serious loss of fertility. Such a farm is a very efficient food 
factory. Perhaps one half of the corn crop is sold from the farms and 
manufactured elsewhere into starch, sugar, sirup, alcohol, and many other 
commercial products. 

The cultivation of corn has reacted upon the farmers to give them a high 
appreciation of the value of scientific agriculture. Fifty years ago their 
methods were not much superior to those of the squaws, although their 
product was greater on account of the use of better tools and animal power. 
Now, through the agency of the agricultural colleges, " corn schools " are 
conducted, and "corn trains " travel over the railroads, giving practical 
instruction and demonstration to all who will assemble at the stopping 
places. In rural public schools prizes are offered to the pupil who raises 
the best crop of corn. Every enterprising farmer pays careful attention to 
the selection of seed, fertilizers, cultivation, and economical methods of 
harvesting. The results are that corn growing has become an intelligent 
and scientific business, and the crop of 191 7 amounted to more than 3000 
million bushels, or about 80 per cent of the world's crop, and was worth 
nearly 4000 million dollars. 

Wheat (p. 271). — The wheat lands overlap and coincide to 
some extent with the corn lands, but are less continuous (Fig. 
308) . Wheat is crowded out of some parts of the corn belt, not 
because it will not grow there, but because corn is more profit- 
able. Wheat does not require so long or so warm a season to 
ripen as corn, and hence extends much farther north, even to the 
Mackenzie plain and the Rocky Mountains. The wheat fields of 
the Saskatchewan and Red River basins are possible because of 
the many hours of sunshine and frequent showers in summer. 

In the southern part of the wheat belt the grain is sown in the autumn 
and harvested the following summer, and is hence called winter wheat. 
The seed is sown in finely pulverized soil by means of horse drills which 
plant it in rows at a uniform depth. No cultivation is necessary. A snow 
covering in winter, and a cool, damp spring are most favorable. The 
grain is harvested in June or July by means of reapers which cut and bind 
it into bundles. It is left to cure in shocks and is drawn thence to threshers 
in the field, or is first placed in stacks or barns for protection from rain. 
Threshing machines are run by steam engines, and travel about from farm 



MISSISSIPPIAN AND FLORIDAN PROVINCES 



363 



to farm. The straw is stacked for bedding and fodder for stock, or baled 
and drawn to paper mills. 

In the northwest, where the winters are severe and the growing season 
less than five months, spring wheat is the leading crop. It is sown in April 
or May, and as the ground thaws, water rises to the roots. Thousands of 
acres may be comprised in a single field, and the work of harvesting in 
August and September is done by machinery upon a correspondingly large 
scale (Fig. 243) . Little or no effort is made to utilize the straw, which is 
burned upon the ground, and thus a part of the plant food is returned to 
the soil in the form of ashes. 




Fig. 309. — Village and grain elevators. North Dakota. 



Wheat is generally marketed at an elevator, which is a tall building 
erected beside a railroad, and equipped for the handling and storage of 
grain. Thence it is sent to mills, the largest of which are situated at 
Minneapolis, where the falls of St. Anthony furnish water power. At the 
mills the grain is cleaned, crushed between steel rollers, sifted, and reground 
until about 75 per cent of its weight is converted into flour. The remainder, 
consisting of middlings and bran, is fed to stock. 

The wheat crop of the Atlantic provinces in 19 18 was about 
980 million bushels, worth about 2000 million dollars. This is 
90 per cent of the total crop of North America, which is the only- 
part of the world where " the struggle for bread " has been 
entirely successful, and where " white bread " is so cheap and 
abundant that it is sometimes furnished at restaurants and 
hotels without extra charge. 



364 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

Oats (p. 273). — Oats are grown in the same manner as spring wheat 
throughout the wheat belt, and in regions too cool and wet for wheat. 
The grain and straw are largely fed to horses and mules, which furnish 
nearly all the animal power for cultivating the land and for local travel 
and transportation. The use of oatmeal for human food, formerly common 
in Scotland where wheat cannot be raised, has spread to all parts of tem- 
perate North America. The crop of 191 8 in the Atlantic provinces was 
about 1800 million bushels, or 90 per cent of the total for North America. 

Rye and Barley (p. 273). — Rye and barley are hardy grains which 
are profitable under conditions of climate and cultivation too severe for 
wheat. Rye is usually sown in the late autumn, and barley in the spring. 
They are used for stock food, and for making beer and whisky. A limited 
amount of rye is made into bread. Rye straw is valuable for making 
coarse wrapping paper. In 19 18 the barley crop of the Atlantic provinces 
was 276 million bushels, or 80 per cent of that of North America, and the 
rye crop 97 million bushels, or 98 per cent of that of North America. 

Potatoes (p. 274). — The potato plant is a native of South 
America, where it formed the food basis of the native Inca civili- 
zation of Peru. Potatoes flourish in a wide range of climate 
through the temperate and cold temperate zones even as far 
north as the Arctic circle. From their use as the chief food 
supply of Ireland, they have received the name of Irish potatoes. 
The best quality is produced upon light, sandy soils, especially 
those of glacial moraines and kames (p. 121 and Figs. 47, 112). 
Besides being one of the most common and cheapest of foods, 
they are a source of laundry starch and in some countries of 
alcohol. The crop of 1918 in the Atlantic provinces was 457 
million bushels, or 90 per cent of that of North America. 

Mississippian Fruits. — Among the fruits of the Mississippian 
province, the apple is foremost and is raised from Ontario to 
Tennessee. The great apple belt extends from New York to 
Missouri, the total product being about 200 million bushels. 
Large quantities are dried in local kilns for shipment abroad. 
Pears, peaches, plums, and cherries are often grown in the apple 
districts. Lake Erie and some of the Finger Lakes of New York 
(p. 126) are nearly surrounded by belts of vineyards, which are 



MISSISSIPP1AN AND FLORIDAN PROVINCES 365 

protected by the water from too early warm spells in spring 
and too early frosts in autumn (Fig. 251). The Erie belt 
occupies a strip of land once covered by a glacial predecessor 
of the present lake (p. 125). New York is second only to 
California, among the states, in number of vines and in quantity 
of grapes produced. 

Tobacco (p. 286). — Tobacco can be raised wherever corn 
can, but its actual distribution is determined by many factors 
other than climate, and is very patchy. Kentucky, North 
Carolina, Virginia, Ohio, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, 
and South Carolina produce nine tenths of the United States 
crop, but it is grown from Vermont to Florida. The Atlantic 
provinces raise two thirds of the crop of North America, and 
one half of the world's crop. 

Floridan Crops. — The characteristic crops of the Floridan 
province are cotton, sugar cane, rice, and tropical fruits. The 
corn crop is increasing rapidly in acreage and value. 

Cotton (p. 289). — Formerly cotton was grown by slave 
labor on the plantation system, which, although immediately 
profitable, was destructive to soil fertility. Land was exhausted 
by successive crops and then abandoned. The present system 
is peculiar in its adjustments to labor and capital. The colored 
laborer, with little or no capital, rents from the white owner 
10 to 20 acres, as much as he can cultivate without hiring 
help. Seed is planted in rows in early spring and the crop is 
cultivated largely by hand. The long period of harvest, from 
September to December, makes it possible for the work to be done 
by few hands. The change from plantation to garden culture is 
now being followed by another change toward field culture. The 
baled fiber from the gins is shipped to local mills, or to seaports, 
chiefly Galveston, New Orleans, and Savannah, where the bale 
is compressed to smaller bulk and sent to Europe or the northern 
states. In most years the Floridan province furnishes about 
n million bales, or two thirds of the world's crop, more than half 
of which is sent abroad. 



366 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

The cotton seed, formerly wasted, is now worth about one tenth as 
much as the fiber. The expressed oil is used as food in place of olive oil 
and in making soap. The cake left after extraction of the oil is used at 
home and abroad as stock food and as a fertilizer. Paper is made from 
the hulls and stalks. Cotton fiber has largely displaced linen, wool, and 
silk, both in pure fabrics and in mixtures, and has greatly enlarged and 
cheapened the world's supply of clothing. The present cotton production 
of the Floridan province could be easily doubled. 

Sugar Cane (p. 275). — The area available for sugar cane 
is limited to the coastal plain and mostly to the alluvial valley 
of the Mississippi River. The business requires large capital 
invested in land and machinery. Light railroads are used on 
large plantations to haul the cane to the mill. The total product 
is less than 7 per cent of the 10 billion pounds consumed annually 
in the United States. 

Floridan Fruits. — Peaches, melons, and small fruits are 
grown in all the Gulf states. Florida is second only to Cali- 
fornia in the production of tropical fruits, chiefly oranges. 
Lemons, grapefruit, and pineapples are also grown. A large 
area in southern Florida is occupied by the Everglades, a body 
of shallow, fresh water partly overgrown with marsh plants. 
It is now being drained by the state and reclaimed for agriculture 
and fruit growing. 

Rice (p. 273). — Rice has never been a very important crop in America, 
but has been grown in the Floridan province for two centuries. Since 
about 1890, rice culture has received a new impetus from the introduction 
of improved machinery and methods into the coastal plain of Texas and 
Louisiana. Large fields are leveled and surrounded by a dike, and, after 
seeding, water is supplied from a stream, sometimes by pumping, to flood 
the ground to the depth of a few inches. The water is drawn off before 
harvest, which is accomplished by binders and threshers similar to those 
used for wheat. The milling of rice, which consists in removing the husk 
and polishing the grain, is difficult and costly. Rice is poor in food con- 
stituents except starch, but its use in America is increasing. The crop in 
19 1 8 was about 40 million bushels. 



MISSISSTPPIAN ANT) FLORTDAN PROVINCES 



367 



Minerals, Manufactures, and Commerce 

Coal. — The Mississippian province has more coal than any- 
other province or country in the world, possibly excepting China 
(pp. 312-314). The annual output is nearly 600,000,000 tons. 
There are four principal coal fields, — the Canadian in Nova 




Coal Field* 



Fig. 310. — Coal fields of the United States and Canada. 

Scotia and New Brunswick, the Appalachian, extending from 
Pennsylvania to Alabama, the eastern Interior in Illinois, Indiana, 
and Kentucky, and the western Interior west of the Mississippi 
River. The Gulf states and Alberta have immense deposits of 
lignite as yet little used. Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Illinois, 
Ohio, Kentucky, Indiana, and Alabama, in order, head the list 
of coal-producing states, Pennsylvania alone furnishing about 
one half. 

The anthracite coal, found only in a region of much disturbed and 
folded rocks in northeastern Pennsylvania, amounts to about one fifth of 



368 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

the total product by weight. Its value per ton is about twice that of 
bituminous coal. It is drilled, blasted, and hoisted to the surface, where 
it is assorted in part by hand labor, and shipped to all the surrounding 
country within 500 miles or more, according to the cost of transportation. 
It reaches the Missouri River, the head of the Great Lakes, and in the 
bunkers of ocean steamships many foreign ports. 

The Appalachian field furnishes 60 per cent of the bituminous coal, 
which is distributed as far as the lower Mississippi and through Atlantic 
seaports to Central and South America. About one tenth of the bitumi- 
nous coal is converted into coke by heating in ovens, the volatile parts 
going to waste. This does not include the gas-house coke made as a by- 
product in the manufacture of illuminating gas. The coke is used chiefly 
for smelting and melting iron, and is sent as far as Chicago. 

The coal of the Interior fields, about one third of the whole, supplies 
local markets and finds its way westward nearly to the Rocky Mountains. 

About half of all the coal mined is used in metallurgy, for power in manu- 
facturing and transportation, and for lighting. 

In mining coal, shafts are sunk to the seam and then drifts or tunnels 
are run in every direction. A seam less than 4 feet thick is difficult to 
work. If the overlying rock or roof is not strong, timbers must be used to 
support it. Pillars of coal are also left for this purpose, and in this way 
from one fourth to a half of the coal is left in the ground. This waste is 
sometimes avoided by filling the space with earth and broken rock. 

The consumption of coal is now increasing at the rate of 10 
per cent a year. If this rate should continue, the supply is 
likely to be exhausted within two centuries. More efficient use 
of coal, more complete methods of mining, the utilization of 
dust and waste, and the increasing use of water power are likely 
to prolong the fuel supply indefinitely. 

Petroleum and Natural Gas (pp. 314-315). — The Atlantic provinces 
produce about 70 per cent of the petroleum of North America, and 46 per 
cent of the world's supply. Oklahoma, Texas, Illinois, Louisiana, Kansas 
and West Virginia are now the leading states. These provinces also pro- 
duce about 96 per cent of the natural gas used in North America, West 
Virginia, Pennsylvania, Oklahoma, and Ohio having the largest supply. 
This is one of the most uncertain of natural resources. Productive fields are 
liable to be soon exhausted and new fields are frequently discovered. 



MISSISSIPPIAN AND FLORIDAN PROVINCES 



369 




— i-r-STTx 




Fig. 311. — Petroleum and natural gas fields of the United States and Canada. 

Iron (p. 299). — There are two great iron-mining districts in 
eastern North America, — the Lake Superior and the Alabama, — ■ 
with minor centers in Newfoundland, New York, Pennsylvania, 
Tennessee, Virginia, and New Jersey. Of these the Superior 
district produces about 85 per cent of the total, and the Alabama 
district one tenth. 

The Superior district is a part of the Laurentian peneplain and belongs 
to the Canadian province, but is commercially a part of the Mississippian 
province. Iron occurs in nine 
" ranges " or ore belts near the 
shores of Lake Superior in Michi- 
gan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, and 
Ontario. The ore is generally rich 
in metal and free from troublesome 
impurities. In the Mesabi range in 
Minnesota it is excavated from 
open pits by steam shovels, and 
the cost is thus reduced to a 
minimum (Fig. 278). To these mines are due the leading position of the 
United States in iron and steel production, and the extraordinary develop- 
ment of all American industries. They would, however, be comparatively 



h''\Y„„, 




312. —Superior iron and copper district. 



370 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

worthless without the waterway of the Great Lakes by which the ore is 
transported to the coal fields. The Michigan ore goes largely to South 
Chicago, Joliet, and Gary, at the head of Lake Michigan, while the larger 
portion shipped from Duluth, Superior, Ashland, and Two Harbors is dis- 
charged at Cleveland and specially constructed ports on the south shore 
of Lake Erie, from Toledo to Buffalo. Thence it is distributed by rail 
throughout the Pittsburgh district, which includes western Pennsylvania, 
eastern Ohio, and northern West Virginia. Mechanical appliances are so 
perfected that the material is scarcely touched by a human hand on the 
way from the ore bed to its exit from the steel mill. Ore may be transported 
iooo miles for 50 cents a ton. Since navigation on the lakes is closed in 
winter, the furnaces must lay in a large stock of ore during the summer. 

The Alabama district has Birmingham for a center. The ores are of 
low grade, but coal and limestone are so near that the mining and manu- 
facturing districts are identical. 

The Pittsburgh district produces about 60 per cent of all the iron and 
steel. The Chicago district stands second, and the Birmingham third. 
The supply of high-grade and cheaply mined ores will scarcely equal the 
demand for more than thirty years, but iron is very abundant and widely 
distributed in the earth crust, and the discovery of new deposits, and the 
use of poorer and less available ores, are likely to postpone the danger of 
an iron famine to the remote future. 

Lead and Zinc. — The Ozark region in Missouri produces 34 per cent of 
the lead and 23 per cent of the zinc of North America. 

Manufacturing Districts and Centers. — The Atlantic prov- 
inces produce about nine tenths of all the goods manufactured 
in North America. Some form of manufacture is carried on in 
nearly every community. Industries in which the cost of labor, 
especially skilled labor, is greater than that of raw materials are 
relatively independent of natural conditions and may be carried 
on almost anywhere. An industry once established often per- 
sists after the special advantages which brought it into existence 
have disappeared, by what may be called economic inertia. 
Under the control of raw materials, power, and transportation, 
there are several districts of concentration, each of which has 
some special characteristics.. 

New England has priority in time and product per capita 



MISSISSIPPIAN AND FLORID AN PROVINCES 371 

because the natural conditions are almost ideal (page 318). 
Among them are position near to European markets and labor 
supply, good harbors and ocean transportation, water power, 
and communication with the food resources and markets of 
the Central Lowland. Water power derived from streams of 
rapid fall and narrow valleys is easily supplemented by coal 
from Pennsylvania. Labor now comes largely from French 
Canadian immigrants. The textile industries predominate, es- 
pecially cotton and wool spinning and weaving in New Hamp- 
shire, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Rhode Island. Fall 
River is the greatest cotton-manufacturing city in America. 
Massachusetts leads in the output of boots and shoes, but there 
is a strong tendency to westward migration of the industry. 
The metal work is chiefly in small wares, such as bicycles, fire- 
arms, brass and plated ware, clocks, watches, and jewelry. 
Steel ships are built at Bath, Me., Quincy, Mass., and New 
London, Conn. New England produces about one seventh of 
the manufactured goods of the United States. 

The Northern Appalachian district, from New York to Mary- 
land, enjoys all the advantages of New England, with the addi- 
tion of abundant coal and larger food-producing capacity. The 
iron industries have been previously described. Philadelphia 
is noted for carpets and woolen goods. The cities of New 
Jersey near New York form a center of silk manufacture. 
The Mohawk-Hudson valley is preeminent in knit goods, gloves, 
collars, and cuffs. Ready-made clothing gives rise to a very 
large industry in all the great cities, especially New York. 
Bayonne, N. J., is the refining center for petroleum brought 
by pipe lines from the Pennsylvania fields. The Delaware 
River is the center of American steel ship building. Cars are 
built at Albany, N. Y., Wilmington, Del., and Altoona, Pa., 
and locomotives at Chester, Pa., and Schenectady, N. Y. The 
clays of the Hudson and Lehigh valleys and the coastal plain are 
of great importance in the manufacture of brick, tile, pottery, 
and Portland cement. Beds of rock salt and gypsum in central 



372 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

New York furnish material for soda, fertilizer, and plaster. 
The canning of fruit and vegetables is a widespread industry. 
Roasting and grinding of coffee and spices and refining of sugar 
are carried on at the great seaports, especially New York and 
Philadelphia. The industries of the Northern Appalachian dis- 
trict include almost every line of manufacture, and transporta- 
tion facilities are such that most of them are independent of 
narrowly local conditions. The manufacture of 60 per cent of 
the gloves of the United States at Gloversville, N. Y., and of 
80 per cent of the collars and cuffs at Troy, N. Y., are accidents 
rather than the results of local conditions. The district is 
credited with about three eighths of all the manufactures of the 
United States. 

In the Central district (Ohio to Missouri and Minnesota) , coin- 
ciding substantially with the Central Lowland, the industries 
are more varied and diffused than those of any other district. 
This is due to the wide distribution of coal and the abundance 
of raw material for foodstuffs. There is marked concentration 
along the waterways, especially the Great Lakes, which play 
a part similar to that of the sea in the East. Aside from 
the iron industry already noticed, processes connected with the 
preparation of foodstuffs, such as meat packing, flour milling, 
fruit and vegetable canning, and the preparation of breakfast 
foods, naturally hold first place. Chicago does a larger business 
in the slaughtering of animals, and the utilization of animal 
products, than any other city in the world. No part of the 
animal is wasted, even the hair, horns, hoofs, blood, and bones 
being turned to account. Kansas City, St. Joseph, Omaha, 
St. Louis, and Indianapolis do a large business in the same line. 
Minneapolis has grown up at the falls of St. Anthony, which 
have made it the first city in the world in the grinding of wheat. 
This is a leading industry also in Kansas City and Toledo. 
Starch, glucose, and sirup made at Chicago, and breakfast foods 
from wheat, oats, and corn at Cedar Rapids, Iowa, and Battle 
Creek, Mich., are not confined to those cities. The lumber and 



MISSISSIPPIAN AND FLORIDAN PROVINCES 



373 



wood-working industries, once foremost, are declining with the 
disappearance of the forests, but survive in many localities. 
Cities on the lakes and the upper Mississippi still saw pine 
lumber and make sash and doors. Wood pulp for paper is 
ground by water power near Green Bay, Wis., and Duluth, and 
at.Sault Ste. Marie. Grand Rapids, Mich., Rockford, 111., 
Sheboygan, Wis., and Cincinnati are centers for furniture made 
from hard wood. Agricultural implements, tools, and vehicles 
are made in this district more extensively than elsewhere because 
they are more used there. Chicago is the principal center, with 
Moline, 111., Springfield, 0., St. Louis, South Bend, Ind., Jack- 
son, Mich., and Racine, Wis., as competitors. The making of 
leather and leather goods has extended from New England to 
the district where hides are plentiful and footwear in demand. 
St. Louis is second to the Massachusetts cities in the manu- 
facture of boots and shoes. 

The center of manufacture of the United States has moved 
westward with the center of population, but not so rapidly, 




Fig. 313. — Centers of population, manufacture, and cereal production. 

and is now in Ohio. The states in order of manufacturing im- 
portance are New York, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Massachusetts, 
and Ohio. The Central district is credited with three tenths of 
the total manufactures of the United States. 

The Southern district, comprising the states south of the Poto- 
mac and Ohio rivers, is in the main agricultural. As long as the 
plantation system and slave labor existed little but agriculture 
was possible. The manufactures of the southern district are 



374 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

chiefly from domestic materials, of which cotton is the most valu- 
able. Since .1905 cotton mills have been built chiefly along the 
Fall Line (p. 105), where water power is plentiful, and now about 
one fifth of the cotton grown is manufactured at home, the 
southern mills equaling in capacity those of the northern states. 
Tobacco from Cuba is made into cigars at Key West and Tampa, 
and the domestic crop is handled at Louisville, Richmond, Peters- 
burg, and Durham, N. C. Sugar is refined at New Orleans. 
The forest products consist of tar, pitch, turpentine, and lumber. 
The cypress of the swamps, the yellow pine of the sandy coastal 
plain, and the hard woods of the uplands make the South the 
chief seat of the lumber industry in the eastern United States. 
The Southern district produces one tenth of the total manu- 
factured goods of the United States. 

With the probable future extension of waterways, the indus- 
trial districts will have a tendency to coalesce. One practically 
continuous urban and manufacturing district may be looked for, 
extending from St. Louis and Chicago to Philadelphia, New 
York, and Boston, with outlying centers strung along the 
Mississippi. 

Transportation. — The Appalachian highland forms a barrier 
which separates the Atlantic seaboard from the Interior plain, 
and had a great influence upon the early history and settlement 
of North America. It is. completely broken through by the 
gap of the Laurentian lakes and river. The drowned valley of 
the St. Lawrence lets the tide and shipping 900 miles into the 
land, to Montreal, and small boats penetrate to the head of 
Lake Superior, 2000 miles by water and 1000 miles in a direct 
line from the sea. Modern improvements have made this the 
greatest commercial waterway of the world, next to the north 
Atlantic Ocean (p. 103). 

Canals. — The St. Marys Falls Canal, commonly known as " the Soo," 
first opened in 1855, and subsequently enlarged, enables vessels drawing 
21 feet to pass the rapids between lakes Superior and Huron. A second 
canal, of equal depth, has been built on the Canadian side. The total 



MISSISSIPPIAN AND FL0R1DAN PROVINCES 



375 




Soo Canals. 



tonnage passing through these canals in one season of less than eight 
months is about 60,000,000 tons, or more than four times that of the 
Suez Canal, and equal to the com- 
bined tonnage of New York, Lon- 
don, and Liverpool. This freight, 
however, consists principally of 
iron ore, lumber, and coal, bulky 
articles of much less value than 
those passing Suez. The total 
traffic of the upper lakes through 
the Detroit River amounts to 
70,000,000 tons. The drop of 326 
feet in 30 miles from Lake Erie to 
Lake Ontario is a barrier which can 
be passed only by the Welland Canal, 14 feet deep and having 26 locks. 
In Lake Erie the stream of goods breaks up into many branches, a small 
part passing to Lake Ontario and down the St. Lawrence. Most of it is 
transshipped at Erie ports and forwarded by rail. The Canadians are 
deepening their canals to give a 24-foot waterway to Montreal and plan 
to construct a ship canal from Lake Huron through the Nipissing outlet 
(Fig. 113) to the Ottawa. 

Another gateway through the Appalachian barrier, now even 
more important than the St. Lawrence, is the Mohawk-Hudson 
valley, traversed by the Erie Canal and the New York Central 
Railroad with six or more lines of track. The Mohawk outlet 
(Fig. 113) is a water gap which cuts the highland down to 445 
feet above sea level and joins the tide-water Hudson at Troy. 

The Erie Canal, completed in 1825, from Lake Erie to the Hudson, was 
then an internal improvement of greater value than the subsequent con- 
struction of the railroad. Since that time the increase in the efficiency 
of the railroads has rendered a canal 7 feet deep almost useless. It has 
been deepened to 12 feet and enlarged to transmit barges of 1000 tons. 
This is probably a halfway measure, to be followed in the future by a ship 
canal 24 feet deep, which will enable large vessels to pass from Duluth and 
Chicago to New York. 

Several canals of the old-fashioned type at one time connected the 
St. Lawrence and Mississippi systems, but all are now abandoned. Vari- 
ous plans for a deep waterway from the lakes to the Gulf are proposed, 



376 



REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 



and one or more of them will probably be sometime carried out. The most 
useful and promising routes are from Lake Erie to Pittsburgh, and from 
Chicago to St. Louis. The opening of the Panama Canal will be a powerful 




Fig. 315. —Routes of transportation between Chicago and Atlantic ports. 



incentive to the improvement of the Mississippi, which has been previously 
discussed (pp. 105-111). The complete control and utilization of that 
river may be accomplished in the future, but it is a greater undertaking 
than man has yet anywhere attempted. 

Railroads. — The vast plains of the Atlantic provinces, the 
absence of serious barriers, and the variety of products have 
encouraged railroad building to an extent unparalleled elsewhere 
in the world. The network is very close in the north Atlantic 
seaboard and the Central Lowland (Fig. 316), where few places 
are more than ten miles from a station. The main lines extend 
east and west, some powerful influence seeming to orient the 
rails. 

In Canada the Grand Trunk and Canadian Pacific railways connect Hal- 
ifax and Portland, Me., with all the territory as far west as Chicago, Winni- 
peg, and the Rocky Mountains. The New York Central lines through the 
Mohawk-Hudson gap have no steep grade, long tunnel, high trestle, or long 
bridge between New York and the Mississippi. The Pennsylvania system 
follows the Susquehanna-Juniata to a summit 2160 feet above the sea and 
descends to the Allegheny and Ohio at Pittsburgh. The Baltimore & 
Ohio utilizes the Potomac valley, and crosses the divide at an elevation of 
2620 feet. These systems connect New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and 



MISSISSIPPIAN AND FLORIDAN PROVINCES 



377 



Washington with Chicago and St. Louis. The Chesapeake & Ohio follows 
the valleys of the James and Kanawha to the Ohio, and extends to Chicago. 
One railroad crosses the southern Appalachians at the Swannanoa pass 
(N. C). The Southern Railway system penetrates the whole South from 
the Atlantic to the Mississippi, and from the Chesapeake to the Gulf of 
Mexico. Of the north-south lines, the Illinois Central from Chicago to 
New Orleans parallels the Mississippi and has been a large factor in the 




Fig. 316. —Railroads of the United States and Canada. 

decline of river traffic. An interesting enterprise is the Florida East Coast 
Railway, which traverses the line of "keys" or small islands from the 
mainland to Key West, about half of it being supported by concrete 
arches erected in the shallow sea. 

Such is the excellence of the roadbed, track, bridges, and 
general equipment of the principal trunk lines that one engine 
may draw a train containing 3500 tons of freight, and express 
trains maintain a speed of 60 miles an hour. In spite of this 
and in spite of about 240,000 miles of road in operation, the 
production and movement of goods have become so great that 



37« 



REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 



the roads are inadequate, and would require something like a 
doubling of present trackage and facilities to handle the business 
promptly. This condition is a compelling argument for the 
improvement of waterways. 

Electric Railways. — The present century has brought a rapid exten- 
sion of " interurban trolley lines," or railways for local passenger and light 
freight business, usually following highways and costing little for right of 
way or grading. Single cars at frequent intervals stopping at many points 

bring rapid transit near to every 



man's door. These roads have 
multiplied, especially in Ohio and 
Indiana, where lines radiate in all 
directions from important centers, 
such as Cleveland, Columbus, and 
Indianapolis. They destroy rural 
isolation, relieve urban overcrowd- 
ing, and promote a desirable blend- 
ing of city and country life. 

Highways. — Common wagon 
roads have been until recently 
much neglected, being generally 
little more than a track between 
fences, and in bad weather almost 
impassable. The use of the bicycle 
and automobile has led to the con- 
struction of well-graded highways, 
surfaced with gravel, broken stone, 
cement, or asphalt. Public interest 
is manifested in " good roads " as- 
sociations, conventions, and demon- 




'Q^' 10 20 30.40 

-Electric railways of Indiana. 



Fig. 317 

strations, and a general awakening to the enormous loss entailed by the 
use of bad roads. As a result of multiplied means of transportation, 
there has never been in any period or country so much movement among 
the people and so little isolation,- a condition which tends to increase 
knowledge, sympathy, and a civilization generally diffused among the 
whole body of citizens. 

Foreign Commerce. — The Atlantic provinces are so large 
and varied in resources that if cut off from foreign trade they 



MISSISSIPPIAN AND FLORIDAN PROVINCES 



379 



would be comfortably self-sufficing. At the same time the 
support of their rapidly increasing population and the develop- 
ment of new lands have made a large home market. For these 
reasons domestic trade is much larger than foreign, and is likely 
to continue so. The southern states were the first to produce 
goods to send abroad, and subsisted largely by exporting tobacco 
and cotton. The northern states and provinces did not have 
much to sell until the settlement of the Central Lowland opened 
wheat and corn lands and the Superior mines furnished iron 
ore for industrial development. The demands of the World 
War increased the export of iron and steel, explosives, vehicles, 
and mineral oils to enormous proportions which cannot remain 
permanent. The United States and Canada had to feed a large 
part of Europe, and breadstuff's, meat, dairy products, and live 
animals were sent abroad in vast quantities. Cotton and 
cotton goods, leather, boots and shoes, copper, coal, chemicals, 
and tobacco were also important items. The total exports of 
the Atlantic provinces amounted to about $6,000,000,000 annu- 
ally. Among a great variety of imports amounting to about 
$3,000,000,000, sugar, coffee, cocoa, fruits, hides, rubber, cotton, 
wool, silk, and other fibers and textiles, vegetable oils, and fine 
chemicals held prominent places. The total foreign trade of 
the two provinces is more than four fifths that of all North 
America. About one fourth of it belongs to Canada. These 
conditions of foreign commerce will not continue in times of peace. 

Seaports. — The rich harvest of the sea is clearly shown on 
the Atlantic coast of North America, where five ports of very 
large population, one of them 
the second city in the world, 
handle most of the maritime 
commerce of the continent. 

Montreal (population 471,000) 
has the unique advantage of 
being an inland seaport, nearly 

IOOO miles from the COast, yet Fig. 318.— Vicinity of Montreal. 




380 



REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 



accessible by all but the largest vessels. Thus inexpensive water 
carriage is made as long as possible and foreign markets are 
brought to the heart of the country. The city is built upon a 
large island at the mouth of the Ottawa, where two great inland 
waterways reach tide water. The Champlain gap opens a gate- 
way south to the Hudson. Its commercial position would be un- 
excelled on the continent, if the St. Lawrence were not closed by 
ice about four months in the year, during which goods go by . 
rail to Quebec, Halifax, and Portland. 

Boston. — At the head of Massachusetts Bay, on a harbor 
made by the drowning of several small valleys, Boston presents 
all the conditions required for a great port. The city, originally 
built upon a hilly peninsula of irregular outline, has extended to 
neighboring peninsulas and islands. The original site has been 

graded and enlarged by the fill- 
ing of shallow bays, and is now 
largely occupied by public and 
business buildings. On the 
highest point near the center 
stands the State House, from 
which streets radiate in many 
directions, after the spider-web 
plan. The site presents that 
intimate relation between land 
and water which secures a long 
dock line and brings ships 
and warehouses close together. 
There is space for the residence portion to spread out, and 
it now occupies the mainland to a distance of ten miles. The 
city is accessible by railroads from nearly every direction, 
but, on account of the rough and difficult country of western 
Massachusetts, it is cut off from a large share in the trade 
of the lakes and the Mohawk gap. It is the commercial center 
of the great manufacturing district around it, and the metropolis 
of New England. 




Fig. 319. — Boston and vicinity. 



MISSISSIPPIAN AND FLORIDAN PROVINCES 381 

In a broadly geographic sense, a city is a large body of people 
living close together and having common industrial and social 
interests. Such a unit may be called an urban district and is 
seldom limited by municipal boundaries. The official city of 
Boston has a population of 745,000, and the urban district about 
1 ,000,000. 

New York. — The harbor of New York has been described 
(p. 170 and Fig. 155). The city was originally located at the 
south end of Manhattan Island and now covers that island, the 
west end of Long Island, Staten Island, and a part of the main- 
land on the north. 

Manhattan, about 13 miles long and 2 miles wide, is a ridge of gneiss 
and other crystalline rocks, descending from a height of 200 feet at the 
north to sea level at the south. The slopes, especially the western, are 
in some places steep. The ridge is broken about midway by a transverse 
rift valley, which forms a convenient gap. To prepare such a surface 
for occupation by a crowded, modern city has involved great labor and 
expense. The streets are laid out with mathematical regularity, the 
longitudinal avenues being spaced to give six blocks, and the cross streets 
to give twenty blocks, to the mile. The triangular area at the south end, 
about 2 miles on a side, the oldest part of the city, is less regular and 
forms the heart of the shipping and commercial district. On the west the 
island is separated from the mainland by the Hudson River, too wide 
and deep to be bridged. The west bank of the river is formed by the Pali- 
sades, a high cliff of igneous rock, beyond which is a belt of shallow water 
and tidal marsh 4 miles wide. If defense from attack by land were of 
importance, New York would be a strong natural fortress. The East 
River, about half as wide as the Hudson, separates Manhattan from Long 
Island, and the narrow Harlem River (the " rivers " around New York 
are all straits) from the mainland. Natural barriers render Manhattan 
almost inaccessible by railroads, and until recently only two lines reached it. 
Such a site makes the problems of housing, overcrowding, and transit 
especially difficult. The business concentration in lower Manhattan gives 
that space a value too high for residences, and has crowded people on the 
east side into tenement houses, where the density of 500,000 to the square 
mile is the highest accurately known in the world. A million or more 
of people doing business there are compelled to sleep elsewhere, and have 
their homes in upper Manhattan or in the surrounding region within 



382 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

fifty miles. For the passage of these streams of humanity, the surface 
of the streets has long been inadequate. Railroads elevated upon steel 
trestles form an upper story on many streets, and fines of subway, 
blasted out of the rock beneath the streets, traverse the length of the 
island. The rivers are crossed by ferryboats, and four bridges connect 
Manhattan with Long Island. Many tunnels under the Hudson and 
East rivers are completed or under construction to facilitate the move- 
ment of people. The Pennsylvania Railroad has spent $50,000,000 in con- 
structing a double tunnel from the Jersey shore, under Manhattan and 
both rivers, to Long Island, with an immense station in the heart of the 
city. Brooklyn is built upon the undulating surface of a terminal moraine, 
and is a great boarding house and residence district for the metropolis. 
On the Jersey side of the Hudson, Jersey City, Hoboken, Newark, Eliza- 
beth, Paterson, and many other towns are a part of the New York urban 
district. 

The high value of land on Manhattan has led to an un- 
precedented utilization of space by the erection of steel-framed 
" skyscrapers," or office buildings of many stories, rising in some 
cases to 700 feet above the streets, which are thus made to 
resemble canons. The official city of Greater New York has 
5,000,000 inhabitants, but the Jersey cities and the suburbs 
elsewhere swell the population of the urban district to about 
6,000,000. The present rate of increase is so large that New 
York will probably overtake London within twenty years and 
become the largest city in 'the world. 

New York is not only the financial and commercial center of 
North America, but is also the greatest manufacturing city and 
seaport. Among a vast variety of industries, it perhaps exceeds 
all other cities in clothing, printing and publishing, sugar, copper 
and petroleum refining, tobacco, and malt liquors. Its manu- 
factures constitute one tenth of those of the whole United States. 
The tonnage of the port exceeds that of any other port in the 
world and includes about three eighths of all the foreign com- 
merce of the Atlantic provinces. 

A city like New York is one of the most complex and momentous fea- 
tures of modern geography, and is the result of many causes. 

1. The prime factor is the commodious harbor, long dock line, and un- 




Fig. 320. — Street scene, Broadway, New York. 
383 



384 



REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 



paralleled interlocking of bays, straits, and islands, where land and sea lie 
literally in each other's arms. 

2. The most valuable part of its immediate hinterland, or tributary area, 
is the anthracite coal field, about 100 miles to the west. 

3. Its more remote hinterland is extended to and beyond the Mississippi 
by the Mohawk-Hudson gap leading to the Great Lakes (p. 375). The 
facilities of this route from the interior to the seaboard are so superior to 
all others that the opening of the Erie Canal in 1825 soon gave New York 
a lead which its own momentum, if nothing else, will maintain. In spite 
of the formidable barriers which wall in the city on the land side, one 
gateway is sufficient to give it a command of resources which no other 
can hope to rival. 

. 4. As the landing place of most of the foreign immigrants, it has a 
large and continuous supply of cheap labor, and has become a city of 
many nationalities and languages. Eighty per cent of its inhabitants are 
foreign-born or of foreign parentage. 



uJV Y^'S 7 1 SCALE OF MILES .~~/S 



Philadelphia (1,680,000), in contrast with Boston and New 
York, is a river port 100 miles from the sea, built upon a level 

tract between the Delaware 
and the Schuylkill. Including 
Camden on the Jersey side of 
the Delaware, it has a dock 
line about ten miles long. It 
is accessible by the largest 
vessels, but its greater distance 
from Europe, as compared with 
New York, is a disadvantage. 
Its land gateways are by the 
valleys of the Susquehanna and 
its tributaries to Lake Erie and 
the Ohio. Its distance by rail 
from Cleveland is about the 
same as that from Buffalo to 
New York, but the grades and curves are more difficult. The 
excellent engineering of the Pennsylvania Railroad, which 
crosses the Appalachian ridges by a series of water gaps (Fig. 44), 




Fig. 321. — Philadelphia. 



MISSISSIPPIAN AND FLORIDAN PROVINCES 



385 



has done much to overcome this handicap. Philadelphia is 
closely connected with the Pennsylvania coal field and the 
Pittsburgh iron district. Its foreign commerce is about one 
eighth that of New York. There are no barriers to prevent 
the extension of the city, and it has fewer tenement dwellers 
and more detached residences than any other great Atlantic city. 

Baltimore (585,000), near the head of Chesapeake Bay, 160 
miles from the sea, has a good harbor on the drowned valley of 
the small Patapsco River. Its immediate hinterland includes 
the fruit belt of the coastal plain and the oyster fisheries of 
Chesapeake Bay. Its western gateway is the valley of the 
Potomac, traversed by the Baltimore & Ohio railroad. This 
route across the highlands is more difficult than that of the 
Pennsylvania and is too far south to profit much by connection 
with the Great Lakes. The foreign commerce of Baltimore is 
about one twelfth that of New York. 

Washington (361,000), at the head of navigation on the 
Potomac, is a seaport by nature, but not a commercial or in- 
dustrial city. It was arbitrarily 
located and built as the seat 
of the Federal government and 
is devoted entirely to national 
administration. The site is 
hilly and admirably adapted 
for picturesque effects. To the 
usual gridiron pattern is added 
a system of diagonal streets, 
radiating chiefly from the Capi- 
tol and White House, which 
have commanding situations. 
Street intersections furnish 
many opportunities for small 
parks, and the extent of public 
grounds and the number of imposing buildings make Washington 
a " city of magnificent distances," unique in America if not in 




Fig. 322. — Washington. 



3 86 



REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 



the world. Its population is made up largely of government 
officials and employees. The city is governed directly by Con- 
gress and its citizens have no vote or voice in its management. 
New Orleans (370,000), the delta city 80 miles above the 
mouth of the Mississippi, was founded upon a site which was 
seldom overflowed, but its general level is now about 18 feet 
below the top of the levee (Figs. 69, 100). It is a river and sea- 
port and a shipping point for cotton and sugar. Its foreign com- 
merce, chiefly in exports of cotton, is greater than that of Boston 

or Philadelphia. The opening 
of the Panama Canal and the 
improvement of the Mississippi 
would greatly increase its im- 
portance. 




Xumbers show depth in feet 
SCALE OF MILES 



Fig. 323. — Galveston. 



Galveston (37,000) is not a large 
city, but is interesting for several 
reasons. The economic pressure 
from its hinterland, which includes 
the western part of the Floridan 
province and southern part of the 
Interior, compelled first the estab- 
lishment of a port without a harbor, then the creation of an artificial har- 
bor, and finally the rebuilding of the city after its destruction by a 
hurricane (Fig. 181). Its exports of cotton make it the fifth seaport of 
the United States in amount of foreign commerce. 

Lake Ports. — A chain of cities second in importance only to 
the seaports occupy strategic points along the shores of the 
Great Lakes. 

Toronto (377,000), the second city of Canada, and the capital 
of Ontario, has that rich agricultural province for an immediate 
hinterland, and communication westward through the Welland 
Canal to Lake Erie and by short railways to Georgian Bay. 
A ship canal connecting that bay with Lake Ontario is a 
promising project. 

Buffalo (455,000). — No interior city except Chicago has a 



MISSISS7PPIAN AND FLORIDAN PROVINCES 



387 



more favorable position than Buffalo. At the east end of 
the lake route in the United States and at the west end of the 
Mohawk-Hudson highway, and the terminus of several railroads 
•from the Pennsylvania coal fields, it commands all the great re- 
sources of the northern states. The water power of Niagara 

Falls (p. 94) is at its door 
and the development of 
a great industrial and 
commercial district 
seems assured. 




Fig. 324. — Buffalo and Niagara Falls. 



Fig. 326. — Detroit. 



Cleveland (660,000), on a good harbor at the mouth of the 
Cuyahoga River, shares with Pittsburgh the advantages of the 
leading coal and iron districts of America. It nearly monopo- 
lizes the building of steel ships for the lake trade. 

Detroit (554,000) is an inland strait city by which all the 
traffic of the upper lakes, 25,000 vessels a year, must pass. It 
is also the point of crossing for east-west trunk lines, for which 
a tunnel under the Detroit River has recently been constructed. 



3 88 



REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 



Chicago (2,500,000). — Among modern cities Chicago sur- 
passes all records in rapidity of growth. From a small frontier 
village and trading post, it has become the second city in 
America, and the fourth in the world, within the memory of 

persons still living. The head 
of Lake Michigan is necessarily 
a strategic point of prime im- 
portance, and the exact loca- 
tion of its city was determined 
by the mouth of a small river, 
which led by an easy portage 
to the Illinois and Mississippi. 
The site is low, marshy, and 
distinctly unfavorable, and the 
business part of the city is built 
upon a mud flat. In 1870 it 
was found necessary to raise 
the grade of streets and build- 
ings several feet. Neither this, 
nor the great fire of 187 1, which 
destroyed a large part of the 
Fig. 327. -Chicago. c j t y^ ^ as sufficient to check its 

progress. Such a result is due to an extraordinary combination of 
conditions. Chicago is at the head of the lake route in the north 
central states. All the east-west land traffic must pass around 
the head of Lake Michigan, producing a concentration of rail- 
ways unequaled elsewhere. It is the trade center of the Cen- 
tral Lowland, including the corn, wheat, cattle, and swine belts, 
and its hinterland extends to the Rocky Mountains. It is 
nearer than the Lake Erie ports to the Superior iron and copper 
mines, and has the eastern Interior coal field at its doors. It 
commands the timber of the coniferous forest in the North and 
the hardwood forests in the South. All the elements which 
create and sustain commercial and industrial greatness are 
present on a large scale. It is preeminently a market for grain 







MISSISSIPPIAN AND FLORIDAN PROVINCES 



389 



and wheat. The Chicago River harbor is artificial and inade- 
quate and is supplemented by that of the Calumet and others 
farther south. The city has spread out over an area of glacial 
plain about 10 by 25 miles. Although there are crowded dis- 
tricts, as in all large cities, the general density of population is 
low. The highest points in the city are only 30 feet above 
the lake, and the drainage problem has been solved by a canal 
to the Illinois River. Thus an old glacial lake outlet (Fig. 113) 
has been reopened and part, of the drainage of the upper lakes 
is diverted from the St. Law- 
rence channel. The population 
includes people of every Euro- 
pean nationality, the foreign- 
born amounting to 36 per cent. 
Other Cities. — St. Louis 
(750,000), once the rival of 
Chicago, has been retarded by 
the decline of Mississippi River 
traffic, but vies with it as a rail- 
way center. On the Mississippi, 
between the mouths of the Missouri and Ohio, it stands at the 
center of the whole river system. Its future is largely bound 
up with that of river navigation, but in any event must be 

great. The levee forms a 
dock line, and the river is 
crossed by two bridges. 

Minneapolis and St Paul 
(600,000), twin cities, at the 
head of navigation on the 
Mississippi, are centers of 
the grain and lumber trade 
of the Northwest. 

Pittsburgh (572,000), at the 
head of the Ohio, has been 
made primarily by a single seam of coal 16 feet thick. Its leading posi- 
tion in the iron industry has been discussed. 




Fig. 328. — St Louis. 




Fig. 329. —Pittsburgh. 



3QO 



REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 



Cincinnati (407,000) and Kansas City (380,000), each located at an 
important bend of a great river, rely more upon railroads than upon water 
connections. Improvements in either river might reverse this. 

Winnipeg (136,000), Manitoba, midway between the international 
boundary and Lake Winnipeg, stands in a gateway or narrows through 
which all east-west Canadian traffic must pass, in that respect resembling 
Chicago. It is and must remain the trade center of the grain and grazing 
territory of the Canadian Northwest. If that develops according to present 
indications, Winnipeg is destined to be the largest strictly inland city of 
America, and may be connected with Hudson Bay by rail, and with Lake 
Superior by a canal. 



Summary of Productions, etc., of the Mississippian and Floridan Provinces 



Corn (maize) 

Wheat : 

Oats , 

Barley 

Rye 

Potatoes 

Cotton 

Tobacco 

Rice 

Coal 

Iron ore (including Superior district) 

Petroleum 

Natural gas ' 

Foreign commerce 

Population 



North America, 
per cent 


World, per cent 


99 


TO 


90 


22 


90 




80 




98 




90 




98 


62 


70 


50 


80 




90 


5° 


98 


40 


70 


46 


96 




80 


18 


70 


5-5 



The Other Provinces of the Mississippian and Floridan Types are of 
so great industrial importance that they will be treated in later chapters 
(Chaps. XXX and XXXII). 



CHAPTER XXVI 

THE INTERIOR AND ARIZONAN PROVINCES 

The Interior and Arizonan provinces of North America have 
many common and strongly marked characteristics, (i) They 
are nearly all plateaus and mountains, most of the surface lying 
above 2000 feet, and above all but the higher peaks of the 
Atlantic division. (2) They are continental and interior, for, 
although the Arizonan province touches the sea, neither province 
is much affected by its influence. (3) The ranges and contrasts 
of temperature are extreme, the annual absolute range in the 
north amounting to 160 degrees. Minima of — 6o° and maxima 
of 127 occur, but not at the same place. (4) They are arid or 
semiarid, the rainfall being, everywhere except on the moun- 
tains, less than 20 inches, and in some places less than 5 inches. 
(5) Except at elevations above 6000 or 8000 feet, they are tree- 
less and exhibit every gradation from rich steppe to absolute 
desert. (6) They are rich in gold, silver, copper, lead, and other 
metalliferous ores. They are bounded on the southeast by that 
most important natural limit, near the 100th meridian, where 
the 2000-foot contour and the 20-inch rainfall line nearly coin- 
cide; and on the west by the Cascade Mountains, Sierra Nevada, 
and the Pacific. Their area is about 1,500,000 square miles 
and their population about 5,000,000, or 3! to the square mile. 

The American Interior Province 

The American Interior province includes the Great Plains, the 
southern Rocky Mountains, the Columbia Plateau, and a part 
of the Mexican Plateau. It is distinguished from the Arizonan 
province by having a rainfall above 10 inches, and constitutes 
the great North American steppe. 

391 



392 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

Vegetation. — The economic basis of the plateaus lies in 
three species of grass which grow in bunches, leaving bare 
spaces between (Figs. 201, 202). Bunch grass cures upon the 
ground without cutting, and furnishes nutritious pasturage all 
the year round. It is luxuriant in the valleys, thinner upon 
the uplands, and in drier areas sparse or absent. In the north 
grass is sometimes replaced by various species of artemisia, 
or sagebrush, from a few inches to 3 or 4 feet high, and of 
some value for pasturage. The greasewood, an ill-smelling 
shrub, is used for fuel. In the south various species of cactus 
and the yucca, or Spanish bayonet, abound. Along the streams 
thickets of willow and aspen and groves of cottonwood furnish 
shelter, fuel, and timber better than none. The cottonwood is 
the only important tree, growing occasionally to 5 feet in 
diameter and 70 feet in height, but generally much smaller. 
The wood is soft, easily worked, and fairly durable in a 
dry climate. On the mountains, pine, spruce, fir, and cedar 
form a forest belt between the contours of 6000 and 10,000 
feet. 

Animals. — East of the mountains animal life was originally 
abundant.- The buffalo was the monarch of the plains. These 
" humpbacked cattle," as the early Spaniards called them, were 
one of the largest species of the bison family, the males some- 
times weighing a ton and standing nearly 6 feet high at the 
shoulders. They originally roamed in incredible numbers over 
nearly the whole interior plain of North America. No accurate 
count was ever made, but their numbers were millions. A 
single herd sometimes formed a nearly solid column 25 miles 
wide. There are no records except of their slaughter. During 
the fifteen years required to exterminate them, from 250,000 to 
more than 1 ,000,000 hides were marketed annually. The bones 
of more than 30,000,000 animals were shipped east to bone- 
black and fertilizer factories. The wild horse, descended from 
stock imported by the Spaniards, was plentiful from about 1700 
to the middle of the last century. 



THE AMERICAN INTERIOR PROVINCE 393 

Indian Tribes. — The aboriginal inhabitants of the Interior province 
were red Indians of many tribes and stocks, but all, as was natural in a 
" big game " country, nomadic hunters. Other game was not scarce, but 
the buffalo alone could furnish everything needed for food, clothing, and 
housing. Food supply from this source was often so plentiful that the 
tongues alone were eaten. The tepee, or tent, was covered with skins, 
which were also tanned and made pliable for jackets, leggings, and moccasins. 
The red men were in the stone age of culture, and used no metal except 
native copper for ornament. Their chief weapons were the bow, made of 
wood strengthened with buffalo sinew, and arrows pointed with flint. 
The bow was powerful enough to drive an arrow completely through a 
buffalo's body. Knives, scrapers, and axes were made also of flint. The 
advent of the wild horse, which the Indian learned to capture and ride 
without saddle, gave the tribes of the plains a great advantage, not only 
over their brute neighbors, but over human enemies. Their total number 
probably never exceeded 50,000, and they spent their power and resources 
in petty warfare. For 200 years they made their country a terror to the 
white man. During the whole period of white occupation and settlement 
they were a formidable obstacle, but the destruction of the buffalo cut off 
their food supply, and the close of the Civil War and the advent of the 
railroad made it possible to send against them an adequate military force. 

Cattle Ranges and Ranches. — The first invaders to dispute with the 
buffalo and the Indian possession of the plains were cattle and cowboys. 
European cattle were brought to Mexico by the Spaniards in the sixteenth 
century, and at the opening of the nineteenth century had spread in herds 
of little commercial value over southern Texas. By the middle of that 
century it had been discovered that the grass of the north, upon which the 
buffalo thrived, would rear cattle of one- third greater size than that of the 
south, and herds of wild, long-horned Texas cattle began to be driven 
northward. The " long trail " began to stretch its main lines, with many 
branches, and in ten years covered the land from Texas to Montana, and 
from the Missouri to the Rocky Mountains. The Spanish cattle were 
displaced and absorbed by better breeds, and the swarthy Mexican cow- 
boy gave way to blue-eyed young Americans of a much higher type. The 
strife was ever. for more and better grass, and for an outlet to market. 
The drive was at first northward and back southward, but with the exten- 
sion of the Union Pacific Railroad across the plains between 1865 and 1869 
the main tide was toward the railroad, along which cattle towns sprang up 
as if by magic and became shipping points where hundreds of thousands 
of cattle were transferred from hoof to car. 



394 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

The cattlemen had hardly taken possession of the available area when 
the long trail was abandoned and the free range was broken up into ranches, 
often of immense size, but inclosed with barbed-wire fence. Ranch houses 
were built, of adobe in the south, of logs in the north, wells were bored, and 
windmills to pump water became conspicuous features of the landscape. 
In the north the loss of cattle by starvation and cold was often serious, but 
hay is now made and shelter provided for the time of heavy snow or sleet, 
when the cattle cannot get to the ground. Herding has ceased to be a 
nomadic occupation except in a restricted sense. 

Sheep Herding. — In all the steppe, mountain, and desert regions, 
sheep herding has acquired large proportions, and is profitable where 
herbage is too scanty for cattle. The pasturage has been in many localities 
seriously injured or permanently destroyed by overgrazing. A prolonged 
and sometimes bloody war between the sheepmen and cattlemen has 
occurred. About 58 per cent of all the sheep in the United States are 
raised west of the 100th meridian. 

Transportation and Migration. — Routes of travel and trans- 
portation through the Interior province extend in many cases 
through the Arizonan province also. They have developed 
under peculiar conditions. On account of the absence, or the 
shallow and shifting character, of the streams, many of which 
disappear in summer, waterways play a subordinate part. The 
vast stretches of smooth, gently sloping surface facilitated 
land travel, but the limited food supply and the mountain 
ranges were formidable obstacles. Between the Pacific slope 
and the Mississippi valley was interposed a barrier of steppe, 
desert, and mountain comparable with that of the Sahara be- 
tween central Africa and the Mediterranean coast. It was 
popularly known and commonly mapped as the " Great American 
Desert." 

In 1847 the Mormons, driven out of Illinois, began to migrate to the 
Salt Lake valley, using ox wagons and handcarts to transport women, 
children, provisions, bedding, and utensils. Each party was accompanied 
by beef cattle and milch cows. In 1846-48, the opening of the Oregon 
country tempted thousands of settlers to " cross the plains " by a wagon 
journey of 2000 miles, occupying four or five months. Thus the Salt 
Lake and Oregon trails were made, following the valleys of the Platte 



THE AMERICAN INTERIOR PROVINCE 



395 



and Sweetwater, and through the South Pass to Green River, near which 
the trail forked. The south branch crossed the Wasatch Mountains to 
Salt Lake; the northern branch followed approximately the Snake River 
to the Columbia. At the close of the Mexican War in 1848, an exten- 
sive area was added to the United States on the southwest, with which a 
large trade immediately sprang up, making use of the Santa Fe trail from 




Fig- 330. — Salt Lake, Oregon, and Santa Fe trails, and Pacific railroads. 



the Missouri to the Arkansas, up that valley to the foothills, and thence 
southward to Santa Fe. The discovery of gold in California in 1849 
brought a rush of adventurous fortune seekers over the Salt Lake trail, 
which was extended through the Great Basin and over the Sierra Nevada 
to Sacramento. Thus began the era of the " prairie schooner/' a large, 
well-built wagon with a canvas cover, drawn by multiple teams of mules 
or oxen. In 1858 the discovery of gold on the South Platte, near the 
present city of Denver, swelled still further the flood of emigrants, in this 



396 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

case destined to settle in the province instead of merely passing through. 
It has been estimated that during the height of this movement the tran- 
sient population amounted to 250,000. 

Freight caravans of twenty-five or more wagons, each of about eight 
tons capacity, drawn by twelve yoke of oxen or as many mules, and manned 
by thirty drivers and guards, made the journey from the Missouri to Denver 
in about a month. A line of stagecoaches ran to Santa Fe, carrying the 
mails and eleven passengers each. This developed into the Southern 
Overland Mail, the coaches of which ran from St. Louis by way of Al- 
buquerque, El Paso, Yuma, and Los Angeles to San Francisco, a dis- 
tance of 2759 miles, in about 23 days. During the Civil War the route 
was shifted northward by way of Denver and Salt Lake City. The dis- 
tance was thus reduced to 2000 miles, and the time to 17 days. This 
was accomplished over natural, unimproved roads, mostly destitute of 
grading or bridges, and involved fording rivers, climbing mountains, and 
crossing deserts. In i860 the pony express was established over the 
same route to carry mails between St. Joseph, Mo., and San Francisco. 
Twenty pounds of letters written on the thinnest possible paper were 
carried in leather pouches. The horse was ridden at full speed for 10 
miles and exchanged for another. The whole trip was made in 10 days. 

Railroads. — As early as 1853 the proposal to build a rail- 
road to the Pacific was submitted to the Congress of the United 
States, and in the seven years following many possible routes 
were thoroughly surveyed. The prime object was to secure 
the trade of the Pacific and the Orient. During the Civil War 
the new states of California and Oregon were in danger of 
attack from domestic and foreign enemies, and the government 
was paying $7,000,000 a year for the transportation of mails. 
A Pacific railroad had become a political, military, and commer- 
cial necessity. It was not until 1864 that capitalists were in- 
duced by a liberal grant of land and money to undertake the 
construction of a railroad 2000 miles long, with only two con- 
siderable centers of population near the line, one around Denver 
and the other in the Salt Lake basin. Little local traffic was 
expected, and the line had to be built and defended in the face 
of hostile Indians. In 1865 the Union Pacific was begun from 
Omaha westward, following closely the old emigrant trail to 



THE AMERICAN INTERIOR PROVINCE 397 

Salt Lake. At the same time the Central Pacific began to be 
extended eastward from Sacramento along the overland mail- 
coach route, and in 1869 the rails of the two roads met on the 
north shore of Great Salt Lake. 

The opening of the first railroad was the beginning of the end of a state 
of society such as never existed before or since. A conglomeration of 
hunters, cowboys, gold seekers, miners, " bullwhackers," " mule skinners," 
coach drivers, express riders, soldiers, civil engineers, graders, track layers, 
emigrant families, adventurers, gamblers, thieves, and desperadoes of all 
sorts rendered organized society impossible. There was no established 
civil government, no courts, no law, and no policing except by small detach- 
ments of troops, stationed at scattered army posts. Over and against all 
were the ever-active Indian tribes, raiding, burning, stealing, and killing in 
desperate defense of their homes and fatherland. Local organizations of 
vigilantes administered summary justice under "lynch law," and maintained 
such semblance of order as was possible. Human life was one of the cheap- 
est and most precarious of possessions. No estimate can be made of the 
thousands of men, women, and children who were sacrificed in the struggle 
and filled nameless graves. The environment called for men of reckless 
courage, iron hardihood, and incredible physical endurance. Only the 
fittest survived. This chapter in the development of the North American 
steppe covers barely twenty-five years, but stands unique in human eco- 
nomics. The " Great American Desert" was conquered for civilization, and 
white men won the plateaus and mountains for a permanent possession. 
The buffalo was speedily exterminated, and the Indian reign of terror was 
soon put to an end. Wild beasts, wild Indians, and bad white men do not 
thrive near a railroad. It is a great promoter of peaceful and prosperous 
civilization. 

Progress of Agriculture. — The sale of railroad lands in small 
tracts and the invasion of the Interior province by the farmers 
were among the factors which led to the breaking up of the free 
cattle ranges and the reduction of the size of ranches. Since the 
opening of the present century, the encroachments of agriculture 
upon the pastoral region have been rapid. This has been due 
to two causes, — irrigation and dry-farming. Irrigation has ex- 
tended along the valleys of the large and permanent streams 



398 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

(Figs. 36, 60, 90, 94) from the mountains eastward. It is prob- 
able that, by the construction of dams at the mouths of the 
canons and the storage of flood waters, a continuous belt of land 
along the eastern foot of the Rocky Mountains will be reclaimed 
for agriculture, as has been so successfully done along the western 
foot of the Wasatch. The Great Plains are underlain by water- 
bearing strata (Fig. 133) which can be reached by artesian wells, 
and many of these furnish sufficient water to irrigate a good- 
sized farm. 

Perhaps still more important is the process of dry-farming. The method 
consists in conserving the rainfall of two or three years to raise one crop. 
This is done by frequent cultivation, which keeps the surface soil pulverized 
and prevents evaporation (p. 147). The introduction of new varieties of 
plants, such as durum wheat, Kafir corn, millet, spelt, sorghum, and alfalfa, 
which yield a crop with less moisture than the old varieties, is an essential 
factor. The most valuable of these drouth-resisting plants is alfalfa, a 
species of clover which, by means of very deep roots, utilizes ground water 
and yields several crops a year. Alfalfa fodder is very nutritious and 
fattens all kinds of domestic animals, while its root tubercles maintain the 
fertility of the soil (Fig. 282). 

The remarkable success of dry-farming may be due to a period of unusual 
rainfall and may be checked by a period of scant rainfall to follow. The 
arid regions are now in an unstable state of economic development, and 
what their condition will be ten or twenty years hence is uncertain. Much 
the larger part of the area will always remain a typical steppe devoted to 
herding, but with considerable local modification by agriculture. 

Mining. — The importance of mining, especially of the 
precious metals, in the development of the Interior province, 
has already been noticed. A detailed discussion of mining will 
be given in connection with the Arizonan province (pp. 405-408). 

The Eurasian Interior Province. — The great Interior province of 
Eurasia presents features and conditions similar to that of North America 
but on a much larger scale. It comprises the loftiest plateaus and moun- 
tains in the world, and the largest depression below sea level. Its climate is 
subject to great extremes of temperature, and it is a land of strong contrasts. 



THE INTERIOR PROVINCES 399 

The depressions are arid wastes of drifting sand, dotted with shifting 
lakes, and marshes incrusted with salt. The mid-slopes, watered by light 
rains and intermittent streams from the highlands, are covered with luxuri- 
ant grass in summer, and constitute the most extensive steppe and pastoral 
region in the world. The summits are rugged, barren, and covered with 
snow and ice. Trees are generally absent, and flowers in their season very 
abundant. It is the original home of our domestic horses, cattle, and 
camels, as well as many of the cereal grains. Insects and migrating birds 
are numerous, reptiles and wild mammals few. 

The Khirghiz of Turkestan are typical pastoral nomads, migrating with 
their herds of sheep and cattle to the high pastures in summer, and re- 
treating to the valleys in winter. Agriculture is confined to the raising 
of hardy grains and the cutting of hay, and is carried on only by the poorer 
people. Wealth consists wholly of live stock. Fat-tailed sheep are most 
common, and their flesh, milk, wool, and skin form the basis of human 
economy. Cattle, yaks, and camels are kept for milk, hair, and hides, 
and are used as beasts of burden. Horses are held in such high esti- 
mation that they are never used as pack animals. The dwellings are 
round tents of poles covered with woolen felts, and can be taken down, 
packed on oxen and camels, and set up in a few hours. Furniture and 
utensils are all easily movable, consisting of felts, rugs, quilts, leather 
buckets, and wooden bowls and spoons (Fig. 252). Cooking is done in 
iron pots over a fire of dried dung. The principal garments are quilted 
gowns of cotton, sheepskin coats, rawhide boots, and felt caps. The 
usual meal consists of a first course of tea and kumiss, or fermented mare's 
milk, followed by roasted or boiled mutton. The people are extremely 
courteous and hospitable to travelers, especially to foreigners, providing 
tent, food, and fresh horses without charge. The province is now mostly 
under Chinese and Russian control. Railroads have penetrated a short 
distance from the west and bring to the natives such luxuries as tea, sugar, 
china bowls, and silk cloth. 

The Patagonian Province. — Southern South America, east of the Andes, 
is a bleak, wind-swept steppe, occupied by a tribe of gigantic Indians 
who originally subsisted wholly by hunting the guanaco and rhea. Their 
characteristic weapons are bolas, consisting of two or three balls of stone or 
metal, connected by rawhide lines, which are thrown in such a manner as 
to wind around and entangle the legs or neck of an animal. They have 
become expert and inveterate horse riders, and use horse flesh for food, 
and. hides for clothing, tents, and saddles. 



400 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 



The Arizonan Province 



The Arizonan * province comprises the Great Basin, the Colo- 
rado plateau and Wasatch Mountains, and the northern portion 
of the Mexican plateau. The plateaus stand at an elevation of 
2000 to 8000 feet, but are interrupted by the depression of the 
Gila and lower Colorado rivers. 

Climate and Vegetation. — The Arizonan province is distin- 
guished by the highest temperatures and smallest rainfall in 
North America. The July temperature rises locally to no° and 
the maximum to 127 . The mean annual rainfall is in some 
places less than two inches. The general absence of ground 
water renders oases few and of little importance. This is 
partly compensated by two rainy seasons a year, which enable 
many plants to survive the period of drouth. Hence during 
the season of light rains vegetation is surprisingly abundant. 
On the other hand, the rainfall is so variable and in dry years 
so small that a locality with an average of 20 inches may be as 
unproductive as one with much less. The rainfall is roughly 
proportional to altitude, and much of it occurs in the form 
of thunderstorms and " cloud-bursts " upon the mountains. 
Hence the province presents a considerable variety of vegeta- 
tion, — coniferous forests on the high plateaus, steppe grasses 
and thorn scrub of many degrees of density at lower levels, and 
extreme desert conditions in the depressions. " The life of the 
desert lives only by adapting itself to the conditions of the 
desert." The economic basis lies in more or less scanty herbage, 
shrubbery, and small trees, all after their peculiar kind, adapted 
to drouth conditions (pp. 228, 233, 239). 

The Animals of the Arizonan province are characterized by 
ability to live with little water, the use of which is apparently 
unknown to some species. The hard conditions of life have 
developed protective coloration, keenness of sight and hear- 
ing, swiftness of movement on all sorts of ground, appetite 
» 

* Spanish, arida zona (dry belt). 



THE ARIZONAN PROVINCE 4OI 

without squeamishness, and tolerance of hunger and thirst to 
a high degree. Desert animals have need of more cunning, 
energy, endurance, ferocity, and efficiency than their relatives 
in fatter lands. Yet plants and animals unconsciously coop- 
erate to maintain the total quantity of life nearly at a possible 
maximum. The desert becomes dotted with colonies or com- 
munities of plants and animals which live together in harmony 
and mutual helpfulness, while the wide spaces between remain 
lifeless. Without such cooperation, few plants and no animals 
could live at all. 

People. — The indigenous human inhabitants are various tribes of 
Indians, among which the Papagos, or " bean people," are typical desert 
dwellers. They occupy a territory about the size of Iowa in southern 
Arizona and northwestern Mexico, and number about 5000. Whenever the 
rains come they plant corn and beans and harvest two crops a year, but 
not always from the same land. They keep horses for riding and herds of 
half-wild cattle, which are driven about wherever water and pasturage are 
procurable. The better houses are built of adobe, with flat roofs. The 
common dwelling is a dome-shaped hut of mesquite poles thatched with 
grass. The center of family life is the grinding stone, a slab about one 
foot wide and two feet high, set up slanting. On this by means of another 
stone the women grind corn, kneeling and working like a laundress over a 
washboard. By this slow and laborious process meal is made, to be mixed 
into dough and baked on an iron plate into flat cakes called " tortillas," 
which are the staff of life. 

The Papago can ride two or three days without drinking, and subsist 
through a season on very little solid food. Both men and women are very 
strong, fleet of foot, and long-lived. In playing football they will run from 
30 to 40 miles in an afternoon. These desert Indian tribes hold the highest 
records for fleetness and endurance. One courier carried a letter on foot 
nearly 800 miles in five days. 

Pueblo Indians. — The high plateaus and mesas north of the Gila River 
and west of the Rio Grande have been the home of the Pueblo, or village 
Indians, from a time centuries before the coming of the white man. In 
northern New Mexico and Arizona, about twenty pueblos, among which 
Zuni and Moqui are the most important, are now inhabited by about 
10,000 people. A pueblo generally stands upon a high and isolated mesa, 
reached by a single difficult path or rough stairway, and is designed 



402 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

primarily for defense. It consists of a single communal dwelling of many 
rooms, built in several terraced stories. There are few openings except holes in 
the flat roof, and the apartments are reached by climbing up and down lad- 
ders. The material is stone and adobe, with wooden beams to support the roof. 
These people have always been agricultural. Corn is the main crop, to 
which beans and melons, and in recent times wheat, have been added. 
Clothing is made of skin and fabrics woven from native cotton and yucca 
fiber. Perhaps nowhere else have the arts of primitive pottery, and of 
making stone axes, arrowheads, pestles, and ornamental articles, been carried 
to greater perfection. Irrigation has been practiced more extensively in 



•***• 




Fig 331. — Pueblo, New Mexico. 

the past than at present, and the abandoned canal systems testify to a for- 
mer large population. An irrigation system can be constructed and main- 
tained only by the cooperation of many people, and has always been a 
strong agency in promoting community life. The Pueblo Indians show a 
distinct advance in culture over the Papagos, because by means of irriga- 
tion they became sedentary agriculturists instead of half-nomad herdsmen. 

Stock Raising. — Under white occupation, the Arizonan prov- 
ince is being developed by cattle and sheep ranching, mining, 
and irrigation. The open range prevails and the capacity of 
the country to support stock has been greatly reduced by over- 



THE ARIZONAN PROVINCE 403 

grazing. That capacity, here as everywhere, depends upon rain- 
fall. The heated air of the plateaus is displaced upwards by 
inflow from the Pacific; the mountains, acting as condensers, 
receive most of the rainfall, and when covered with natural 
vegetation act as storage reservoirs, from which water is given 
out gradually. Before the white men took possession, the coun- 
try was well grassed and supported vast herds of antelopes and 
deer. With the introduction of cattle, horses, and sheep from 
Texas, grass disappeared, shrubbery and forests were destroyed 
by browsing and fire, and the land was laid bare by torrential 
rains and eroding streams. The drying up of springs and the 
reduction of plant and animal life have been so marked as to 
suggest a change of climate to greater aridity. 

Agriculture. — The agricultural possibilities of the province 
are limited as much by the extreme irregularity of rainfall as 
by its general scantiness. Periods of drought may continue for 
from three to five years, during which practically no rain falls, 
and all except the hardiest vegetation dies. The dry period is 
followed by a period of heavy rainfall. These conditions can 
be overcome only by storage reservoirs on a large scale and by 
dams in the few great rivers. The Mexicans made some feeble 
attempts to restore the extensive prehistoric canal systems of 
the Indians, but accomplished little. The first use of irrigation 
on a large scale by white men was made by the Mormons in the 
Salt Lake basin. They availed themselves of a nearly perfect 
system which nature had provided. The streams flowing from 
the Wasatch Mountains reach the lake through the Jordan River. 
An ancient lava flow had dammed the river about midway of its 
length, forming Utah Lake, a body of fresh water 30 miles long. 
An inexpensive dam in the canon which the river had cut 
through the lava, and ditches to distribute the water, secured 
an immediate food supply, for the impoverished immigrants, and 
the community soon became prosperous. 

Salt River Project. — Irrigation began in the Salt River valley, near 
Phoenix, Ariz., soon after the Civil War, and in twenty years more land 



404 



REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 



had been reclaimed than could be watered in dry years. This led to the 
construction, under the United States Reclamation Service, of the Roosevelt 
dam, completed in igu. This dam, 284 feet high and 1080 long at the top, 
impounds 1,284,000 acre feet* of water. This, with other smaller reser- 
voirs in the district, stores water to irrigate 270,000 acres in the valley 
below. The watershed is mountainous, largely forested, and under govern- 
ment control. Evaporation is so great that the run-off of the Salt River 
basin equals only 2.26 inches of the 16.8 inches of rain that falls upon it. 
Hydroelectric power developed in the canal will be used for pumping 
ground water and sold for industrial purposes. The total cost of the 
project is about $8,000,000, which will be repaid by the land owners using 
the water. 

Yuma Project. — The only large river in the province is the Colorado, 
which obtains its volume from the melting snows of the Rocky and Wasatch 
mountains. These produce an annual flood lasting from April to July, and 
a low stage from September to April. The upper two thirds of the river 
traverses high plateaus in profound canons. In the lower 600 miles it 
has a gentle slope and is bordered by a flood plain terminating in a great 
delta which fills the head of the Gulf of California. In this part of its course 
it repeats upon a smaller scale the features of the Nile in Egypt. The 
Indians, like the ancient Egyptians, raise quick-growing crops upon the 
wet soil left by the receding floods. The available water amounts to about 
9,000,000 acre feet, or sufficient to irrigate 1,375,000 acres in Arizona, 
California, and northwest Mexico, but its complete utilization requires ex- 
tensive storage reservoirs. The United States Reclamation Service has 
completed a dam at Laguna, above Yuma, 19 feet high and 4780 feet 
long, canals, levees, and pumping stations, to irrigate 130,000 acres. 

The Imperial Valley, on the boundary between Mexico and California, 
lies many feet below the level of the Colorado, and is bordered by the 
Salton sink, the bottom of which is 276 feet below sea level. A canal was 
cut to distribute water from the Colorado over this valley. In 1904 the 
whole river at high water turned aside through this canal and discharged 
into the sink, forming a large lake. It required two years' time and 
$3,500,000 to stop the opening and turn the river back to the Gulf. 

Crops. — The lowlands of the Arizonan province produce, 
under irrigation, a great variety of crops. While the summer 
temperatures are very high, the winters are hardly anywhere 
free from frost. During the cool season cereal grains and hardy 

* An acre foot means enough water to cover one acre to a depth of one foot. 



THE ARIZONAN PROVINCE 405 

vegetables are grown, and during the hot season corn, sugar beets, 
tobacco, cotton, and many other kinds of crops. Alfalfa grows 
all the year round and yields five to eight cuttings of hay. 
Date palms, olives, figs, pomegranates, and citrus fruits flourish 
in some localities, and every month in the year brings its har- 
vest. The state of Arizona has water to irrigate 1,000,000 acres 
(less than 2 per cent of its area) and to support 500,000 people. 

United States Reclamation Service. — ■ The United States Reclamation 
Service has undertaken or completed many irrigation projects in the Inte- 
rior and Arizonan provinces, of which the following are among the most 
important: Snake River, Idaho, 400,000 acres; Rio Grande, New Mexico 
and Texas, 180,000 acres; Yakima, Washington, 340,000 acres; Truckee- 
Carson, Nevada, 350,000 acres; Uncompahgre, Colorado, where 150,000 
acres are irrigated by water brought through a six-mile tunnel from the 
Gunnison River; Klamath, Oregon and California, 236,000 acres; Sho- 
shone, Wyoming, 175,000 acres. About 7,500,000 acres are now under 
irrigation by private enterprise. The total area of irrigable land in the 
United States is estimated by different authorities to be from 60,000,000 
to 100,000,000 acres, or one tenth the area of the Interior and Arizonan 
provinces, of which perhaps 30,000,000 acres will be reclaimed by the 
government and sold to settlers in tracts of 20 to 40 acres at prices suffi- 
cient to repay the cost of the works. It is probable that in the near 
future from 5,000,000 to 10,000,000 people will be living upon irrigated 
lands. 

Mining in the Arizonan and Interior Provinces. — The moun- 
tains abound in metalliferous veins, and gold and silver mines 
occur in all the states and territories from Alaska to Mexico. 
The history of their development in different localities is sub- 
stantially the same. Placer mining (Fig. 280) is always the 
first to be carried on, because it requires little machinery or 
capital, and is possible in' regions however rough and remote 
from centers of population. The Washoe district in western 
Nevada, and the Leadville and Cripple Creek districts in 
Colorado, are typical mining camps. 

Washoe District. — The Washoe Mountains are one of the ranges of the 
Great Basin on the western border of the Arizonan province, separated 



406 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

from the Sierra Nevada by only a narrow valley. Placer mines had been 
worked there for some years, and were showing signs of exhaustion when, 
in 1859, a vein yielding ore worth several thousand dollars a ton, which 
came to be known as the Comstock lode, was struck. A stampede of 
miners to the new " diggings " occurred at once, and Virginia City sprang 
into existence. Shafts were sunk and " drifts," or tunnels, run in many 
directions through solid rock to reach the ore. The very wide and rich 
ore bodies, called " bonanzas," were the most difficult to work on ac- 
count of the danger of collapse of the walls. To prevent this, the 
space from which ore was removed had to be filled with timber and waste 
rock. The mines were often flooded with water which, at great depths, was 
hot. Tunnels were constructed to drain the lower levels, and gigantic 
pumps had to be used to lift eight or ten million gallons a day. The 
extraction of the metal from the ore involved the use of costly mechanical 
and chemical processes. The ore was usually reduced in stamp mills, where 
it was crushed under falling weights to a fine powder. The metal was 
then extracted by the use of mercury, potassium cyanide, or chlorine. 

Well-graded wagon roads were built over the mountains from Placerville 
to Virginia City. Over these roads enormous wagons loaded with sup- 
plies or ore were drawn by mules in an almost continuous double proces- 
sion. Before the Central Pacific Railroad was built 3000 men and 15,000 
animals were employed in transporting 750,000 tons of freight a year. 
Probably at no other time or place has animal- wagon transportation 
reached such magnitude and efficiency. Stagecoaches, carrying mails 
and passengers, made the trip between Sacramento and Virginia City, 
162 miles, in 18 hours. The mining district produced nothing but ore 
and had to be fed with everything from outside. It therefore made a 
market for hay, grain, fruit, hogs, cattle, poultry, and other products of 
California, and stimulated every industry in the accessible territory. 

In 1872 the Comstock lode seemed to be nearly exhausted, but a 
bonanza of unparalleled size and richness was opened at a depth of 
1500 feet, and yielded, in five years, $105,000,000. During this period 
the whole group of mines was valued at nearly $400,000,000. Such con- 
ditions led to endless speculation, in which fabulous fortunes were won 
and lost. The high temperature in the lower levels made it necessary to 
blow in air and to use ice in large quantities. A tunnel four miles long 
was run in to drain the mine, but proved inadequate. On account of failure 
of the vein and floods of hot water, work on a large scale ceased about 1880. 
The Comstock lode yielded, in twenty years, gold and silver to the value 
of $358,000,000. The cost of obtaining it cannot be calculated. 



ARIZONAX AND INTERIOR PROVINCES 



407 



The industrial, financial, and political effects were far-reaching. The 
population of the region increased from a few hundreds to about 20,000 
in 1864, when the interests of the community seemed so important that the 
state of Nevada was admitted to the Union and began to send a representa- 
tive and two senators to the Congress of the United States. In 1880 the 
population of the state had risen to over 60,000 and of the Washoe district 
to about 20,000. In 1900 these numbers had fallen to about 42,000 
and 5000 respectively. Few mining districts have a history so dramatic 
as that of the Washoe. 

Leadville, on the headwaters of the Arkansas River in Colorado, was 
a rich placer mining camp as early as 1850, but lost its importance with 
the exhaustion of the placers. In 1875 immense veins of lead ore, very 
rich in silver, were discovered, and for some years the output of silver 
was greater than that of any foreign country except Mexico. Silver is 
now of secondary importance, being exceeded in value by lead, copper, 
zinc, and iron. Leadville, at an elevation of 10,000 feet, is a well-built 
city of about 7000 people, provided with all urban conveniences. 

The Cripple Creek District, on the southwest shoulder of Pikes Peak, 
9500 feet above the sea, produced in the first ten years after the discovery 
of gold there more than $120,000,000, and now has a population of about 
10,000. The ground has been so thoroughly explored by " prospect holes " 
in search of ore that the surface resembles a prairie-dog village. The 
earth crust has been literally ransacked and pilfered. Over 200 mines are 
in active operation, and are connected with one another by electric car 
lines. Leadville and Cripple Creek have had the advantage of railroad 
connections almost from the first, and the period of difficulty and disorder 
usual at such places was brief. 

In 1 9 16 the production of the most important gold and silver districts was 
as follows : 



Gold. 



Silver. 



Colorado, Cripple Creek district. . 

Colorado, total for state 

Nevada 

South Dakota, Black Hills district 

British Columbia 

Montana 

Arizona 

Utah 

Idaho 



512,110,000 
19,154,000 
8,886,000 
7,460,000 
5,166,000 
4,550,000 
3,985,000 
3,574,000 
1,116,000 



$4,976,000 
8,994,000 

2,060,000 
10,727,000 
4,687,000 
8,614,000 
7,995,000 



4 o8 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

There are several small coal fields, of which one near Newcastle, Colo- 
rado, yields anthracite. A very extensive coal field in southern Alberta and 
deposits of lignite in Montana and North Dakota are as yet slightly 
developed. The Arizonan and Interior provinces are rich in water power. 

Copper Mining. — The district near Butte, Montana, pro- 
duces more copper than any other in the world, the Anaconda 
mine alone yielding one-tenth of the world's supply. Placer 
gold began to be mined there in 1864, and silver ore in 1875. 
In 1 88 1 the discovery of copper ore made the district famous. 
The sulphurous fumes produced by the roasting of ores are 
destructive to all vegetation in the vicinity, so that, while Butte 
is one of the wealthiest cities in proportion to population in the 
United States, it is a city without grass or trees. 

Several rich districts in Arizona now give that state first 
rank in the production of copper. Older and even more famous 
copper mines on Keweenaw Point, Michigan, were opened in 
1846, and have now reached a depth of about a mile. The 
copper occurs in scales and lumps of nearly pure metal. One 
nugget was found weighing 500 tons and worth $150,000. 

Mining Economy. — While mining and mineral industries are 
absolutely essential for the existence of an industrial civilization, 
and afford opportunity for the rapid accumulation of wealth, 
they are, in contrast with agriculture and herding, wholly de- 
structive. They are inroads upon what may be called the 
capital stock of the human family, laid up in the bank of the 
earth crust, and no amount of accumulated wealth can ever 
replace them. Gold and silver appeal strongly to the imagina- 
tion and ambition of men, on account of their high value per 
ounce and their use as money, but in the arts they are less useful 
than copper, lead, iron, or coal. The actual market value of 
the precious metals mined in the United States hardly equals 
that of eggs, and the total value of all mineral products is less 
than that of the corn crop. In mountainous and arid regions, 
like the Interior and Arizonan provinces, mining is a pioneer 



THE ARIZONAN PROVINCES 409 

industry, which first attracts population, labor, and capital. 
Railroads, manufactures, and agriculture follow, and all the 
natural resources come to be more fully utilized. 

Transportation. — The development of transportation in the 
Arizonan province is closely connected with that of the Interior 
province already described (pages 394-397). Transportation 
and travel in the desert by animal power are difficult and dan- 
gerous on account of scarcity of water. The automobile, on 
account of its speed and broad tread, is found to be peculiarly 
adapted for desert travel. Man has invented a vehicle superior 
to the camel. 

The Saharan Province. — The largest desert tract in the world extends 
from the Atlantic coast of Africa eastward to India. Its area is half as 
large again as that of the United States. In relief, it is. less varied than 
the Arizonan province. It consists mostly of low, stony plateaus and 
plains of drifting sand dunes. In the central Sahara, the mountainous 
plateaus of Asgar and Tibesti rise above 3000 feet, with peaks up to 8000 
feet above the sea. Arabia is a tilted table-land with a high margin on the 
south and west. There are no permanent streams except the Nile, Eu- 
phrates, Tigris, and Indus, which flow through the province from exterior 
rainy regions. The temperature sometimes rises to 150°, and falls below 
freezing. Light summer rains produce a little grass upon the highlands, 
but vegetation is mostly confined to ground-water oases (Fig. 206) and 
tracts irrigated from the through-flowing rivers or artesian wells. The date 
palm and the camel form the economic basis of human life. A little grain 
is grown, and goats, asses, and horses are used. The people are Caucasians 
of the Mediterranean type (p. 260), among which the Moors, Berbers, 
and Arabs are the most numerous. They are nearly all under the political 
control of France, Great Britain, or Italy, but many of the tribes are prac- 
tically independent. 

Egypt, one of the oldest centers of civilization in the world, has sup- 
ported a dense population for 6000 years. This is made possible only by 
the overflow of the Nile, which flows across the desert, through a cleft in 
the plateau five to thirty miles wide, for 1000 miles without a tributary. 
The flood plain nowhere exceeds nine miles in breadth. The flood begins 
to rise in June, reaches its highest stage of about 25 feet in September, and 
falls rapidly until January. Under British rule the irrigated area has 



410 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

been greatly extended and improved. A dam at Assuan, 6400 feet long and 
91 feet high, was completed in 1902 at a cost of $10,000,000. The water 
above is set back 200 miles, forming a reservoir which contains 215,000,000 
acre feet of water. The irrigated area of Egypt is about 6,000,000 acres, 
and two or three crops a year are grown. The principal crops are, in sum- 
mer, cotton, sugar, rice, and fruits ; in winter, wheat, barley, and flax ; and 
in autumn, corn (maize) and millet. The camel, donkey, and buffalo are 
the most common domestic animals. The present population of Egypt is 
about 12,000,000. 

The Sudan. — The Sahara is bordered on the south by the Sudan, a 
transition belt of steppe and scrub land where grass and acacia flourish in 
proportion to rainfall. The principal occupation is cattle raising. The 
people are of mixed negro and Arab stock. 

Arabia. — The high western and southern margins of this plateau receive 
sufficient rain to produce cereals, coffee, and dates. The rest of the country 
is desert, inhabited only by wandering Bedouin herdsmen and robbers. 
Their wealth consists of sheep, goats, camels, and horses. 

Mesopotamia bears the same relation to the Tigris and Euphrates rivers 
that Egypt does to the Nile. It is an alluvial plain of extreme fertility but 
almost rainless. It needs only the restoration and improvement of the 
ancient irrigation systems to bring back the conditions of the Garden of 
Eden, which once existed there. It is now a land of date palms, but might 
produce tropical fruits, cereals, and cotton. It is sparsely inhabited by a 
mongrel population living in wretchedness. 

Syria and Palestine form a strip of habitable land between the desert and 
the Mediterranean. Its productiveness is limited by scanty rainfall. 
There are some rich oases like that of Damascus (250,000). The popu- 
lation is one of the most mixed on earth. 

The World War has relieved these countries in the Asiatic portion of 
the Saharan Province from the blight of Turkish oppression. The best 
part of Arabia now forms the Kingdom of Hedjaz under a native ruler. 
Mesopotamia, Syria, and Palestine, under the control of Great Britain and 
France, may soon realize their natural possibilities. 

The Kalahari Province, in South Africa, is a worn-down eolian plain 
(p. 49), broken by kopjes, or knobs of resistant rock. It is almost devoid 
of permanent streams, but in the rainy seasons contains shallow lakes, 
marshes, and salt-incrusted mud flats. There are patches of bunch grass 
and bushes which support a rather numerous, fauna, including the antelope, 
zebra, giraffe, rhinoceros, elephant, hyena, jackal, lion, ostrich, and fla- 



THE ARIZONAN PROVINCES 411 

mingo. A conspicuous part in the economy of the province is played 
by several species of melon, which in moist years cover large tracts. 
Animals of all kinds, including man, depend upon them for water sup- 
ply. Their seeds are oily and fattening. The only permanent human 
inhabitants are the Bushmen, yellow dwarfs wholly distinct from the 
negro. They are nomad fishermen, hunters, and thieves, using the sim- 
plest weapons, clothing, and shelter, and possessing no wealth whatever. 
Although among the lowest of men in civilization, they display consid- 
erable art in decorating their bodies, hair, and clothing, are fond of 
singing and dancing, and draw and paint pictures of animals with aston- 
ishing skill. 

The Central Australian Province. — The Central Australian desert 
is made especially repellent by masses of spinifex, a coarse grass growing 
in hummocks full of needlelike prickles. The life of the native inhabitants 
has been noticed on p. 263. Some artesian well areas are utilized by 
white men for grazing, but the only considerable economic resource lies in 
the marvelously rich gold " reefs " around Coolgardie in the southwest. 
Railroads have been built to reach the mining districts, and water is pumped 
through an aqueduct 378 miles long. 

The Peruvian Province extends along the Pacific coast of South America 
nearly 2000 miles. It is almost rainless, but slightly moistened by fogs. 
Agriculture is carried on in a small way along the little streams which 
descend from the Andes but do not reach the sea. The province is very 
rich in deposits of sodium nitrate (p. 304), which is mined and shipped 
to Europe as a fertilizer. Well-equipped, modern cities have been built 
near the nitrate beds, and many short lines of railroad connect them with 
the sea. Fresh water was formerly distributed by coasting vessels, but is 
now piped from the mountains. 



CHAPTER XXVII 

THE CALIFORNIAN AND OREGON PROVINCES 

The Californian and Oregon provinces occupy the Pacific 
ranges and valleys from the Gulf of California to the Strait of 
Fuca. They comprise the Pacific slope of California, Oregon, 
and Washington, an area of about 177,000 square miles, and 
have a population of about 3,500,000. The Coast Ranges border 
the sea throughout, except in southern California, where a plain 
about 50 miles wide intervenes. From the parallel of 35 
N. Lat, where the Sierra Nevada joins the Coast Range, the 
great California Valley, 50 miles wide, extends northward 400 
miles. In northern California and southern Oregon the valley 
is interrupted by the knot of the Klamath Mountains, beyond 
which the valleys of the Willamette River and Puget Sound 
extend to the northern end of the Oregon province. 

Climate and Vegetation. — The two provinces are distin- 
guished from each other- by climatic conditions which change 
gradually between extremes of difference at the northern and 
southern ends. The westerly winds bring to the whole Pacific 
coast a mild, oceanic climate, modified in the north by frequent 
cyclonic disturbances. The range of temperature is generally 
less than 20 degrees. The rainfall increases from less than 
10 inches in the south to more than 100 inches in the north. It 
is heaviest on the western slopes of the mountains and lightest 
in the valleys. The summers of the Californian province are 
almost rainless. In the Oregon province the rainfall is more 
evenly distributed through the year, with a large excess in 
winter. 

The southern lowlands present a characteristic semi-desert 

412 






CAL1F0RNIAN AND OREGON PROVINCES 413 

vegetation, in which the mesquite, greasewood, cactus, yucca, 
and date palm are conspicuous. The foothills and lower moun- 
tain slopes are generally covered with chapparal (p. 234), or 
groves of oak and other deciduous trees. In the south the 
coniferous forest does not reach below 5000 feet, but extends 
down to sea level in the north. It includes species of great 
variety and large size, of which the Oregon pine, Douglas fir, 
spruce, incense cedar, and redwood are most valuable (Figs. 199, 
271). The high mountain summits have an Alpine climate with 
a few small glaciers. 

Agriculture. — The agricultural products of the provinces are 
as varied as the climate. The lowlands of the southern half of 
California, irrigated from the mountain streams, are unsur- 
passed for the production of tropical fruits, such as oranges, 
lemons, figs, olives, and raisin grapes. In the valleys through- 
out both provinces, apricots, peaches, prunes, cherries, pears, 
apples, berries, and wine grapes are prolific and of fine quality. 
The wheat crop of the three states amounts to about 50,000,000 
bushels, but about half of it is raised in the Interior province 
east of the mountains. 

Stock raising has been an important industry since the days 
of Spanish occupation. The settling up and reservation of 
public lands has restricted the open range. Cattle and sheep 
are driven up to the high pastures in summer and back to the 
lowlands in winter. 

Fisheries. — Salmon fishing and canning on the Columbia 
and other rivers, once marvelously productive, is still an im- 
portant industry, although many canneries have been removed 
to Alaska. 

Lumbering. — Of all the forest resources at present available 
in North America, those of the Pacific provinces are probably 
the most valuable. They now furnish about 14 per cent of 
the total annual cut of the United States. Wasteful methods 
have prevailed, and the forests have suffered from sheep and 
from fires. National forest reserves guarded by fire fighters, 



414 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

and the education of the people in forest conservation, may be 
expected to lessen destruction in the future. 

Minerals and Mining. — The discovery of gold in a mill race 
near Sacramento in 1848 was the immediate cause of a rapid 
occupation of the country by people from the eastern states. 
About 100,000 immigrants arrived in one year and $40,000,000 
were taken out. The surface placers were first exhausted. On 
the Sierra slope, many old stream channels, filled with auriferous 
gravel and buried under lava flows, were discovered. This led 
to hydraulic mining. Water brought from the mountains under 
great pressure, and discharged through a movable iron pipe, 
called a " monitor," was used to wash gravel on a very large 
scale. After a time, the agricultural lands below became so 
encumbered with waste that hydraulic mining was discon- 
tinued. In the meantime the " Mother Lode," one of the most 
important series of gold-bearing quartz veins in the world, was 
developed along the middle portion of the Sierra for 150 miles, 
and still yields about $12,000,000 a year. About $8,000,000 a 
year are obtained by excavating and sifting alluvial deposits by 
means of dredges, which make a place for themselves as they go, 
and bring up gold from depths down to 70 feet. For many 
years California led the world in the production of gold, and 
now slightly surpasses Colorado among the states. 

The Coast Ranges of California are one of the principal sources 
of the world's supply of mercury. Since 1850 they have pro- 
duced 150,000,000 pounds. California also produces copper, 
nearly all from the Klamath Mountains, which is smelted with 
coke brought from Australia. On account of the high cost of im- 
ported coal, hydroelectric power is used at most of the mines 
of all kinds. 

In southern California there are several small but very rich 
petroleum fields, one in the city of Los Angeles, and one on the 
coast, which give the state a rank second only to Oklahoma. 
Along the foothills of the Cascade Mountains, within 50 miles of 
the shores of Puget Sound, fields of bituminous coal yield about 



CALTFORNIAN AND OREGON PROVINCES 415 

3,000,000 tons annually. More valuable coal fields exist on 
Vancouver Island in British Columbia. 

Scenery. — The Pacific mountains, valleys, and coasts fur- 
nish some of the finest scenery in the world. The high Sierra 
of California, " with spreading ridge and foothill, rises like some 
huge, sprawling monster, its granite back unbroken for a thou- 
sand miles." The crest has been carved by frost and glaciers 
into a mass of peaks, domes, and cirques, dotted with unnum- 
bered lakes (Figs. 40, 84, 104). The streams flowing down the 
western slope have cut profound canons, of which the Yosemite 
Valley is the most famous. The Hetch-Hetchy, Tehipite, and 
Kings River canons are scarcely inferior to the Yosemite. Many 
volcanic peaks of the Cascade Range, including Lassen, Shasta 
(Fig. 51), Hood, St. Helens, Rainier or Tacoma, and Baker, 
loom up from sea level to near 14,000 feet, in full view from the 
lowlands. Wide views of mountain, forest, and sea, with large 
and clear outlines, are to be had almost everywhere. 

In the Californian province, the weather is predictable for a 
long period in advance. The seasons have been described as 
" half a year of clouds and flowers — half a year of dust and 
sky." The summer is an unbroken succession of sunshiny days, 
warm but never sultry. Even in winter fires are seldom needed. 
Houses are not used primarily as shelters from the weather. 
If it is chilly indoors, people go out to get warm. The air is 
mild but not enervating, and conduces to the enjoyment of out- 
door life. Nature seems kindly, not hostile. By irrigation man 
virtually controls crop production. The great wheat and cattle 
ranches are being broken up into small holdings, from which a 
thrifty family can win a competence without excessive labor or 
anxiety. The natural conditions tend to foster a vigorous and 
long-lived people, conspicuous for individuality and independ- 
ence of thought and action. Southern California is especially 
popular as a health resort' 

Cities and Ports. — Foreign and domestic commerce by sea 
must always play a large part in the economy of the Pacific 



416 



REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 



provinces. Their productive area, though rich, is not large. 
It is a narrow belt isolated on the continental side by a moun- 
tain wall and a wide tract of rugged desert and steppe. 
Whatever men may do to overcome these barriers, the land 
faces seaward, and natural conditions conspire to compel close 
relations with Pacific and Asiatic lands. Foreign intercourse 
westward to the Orient is likely to increase indefinitely in the 
future. On the coast large inlets are few and far apart, but 
three of them offer harbor and port facilities which are unsur- 
passed. 

San Francisco (460,000). — Midway of the Californian coast, 
a local subsidence of the land has drowned the lower Sacramento 

River and let the sea into a longitudi- 
nal valley of the Coast ranges. The 
result is San Francisco Bay, 50 miles 
long and 10 miles wide, landlocked, 
and open to the sea only through the 
Golden Gate, a strait about one mile 
wide. It is a miniature Mediterranean. 
The conditions for a great seaport are 
almost ideal. Fogs over the strait and 
shallow water along the eastern shore 
are the only serious disadvantages. 
The city of San Francisco, the metrop- 
Fig. 332.— San Francisco Bay. olis of Pacific America, almost sur- 
rounded by water, faces the bay and strait, while Oakland on the 
mainland opposite forms an essential part of the port. In spite 
of an earthquake which nearly destroyed the city in 1906, it has 
been rebuilt and has increased in population 21 per cent in the 
decade (1900 to 1910). The natural advantages of site and 
geographic position compel the existence there of a great 
commercial city. It is reached by four transcontinental rail- 
way lines, three from the south and one across the Sierra 
from the east. Its foreign; trade amounts to about $7,000,000 
annually. 




CALIFORNIAN AND OREGON PROVINCES 



417 




^^•••^, 0tt _I.<.,Po,, 



Portland (275,000), on the Willamette River, 12 miles from 
the Columbia and 80 miles from the sea, enjoys the advantage 
of a position virtually on the only river of the Pacific coast which 
is navigable beyond the mountains. An increase of 129 per cent 
in population in the last decade shows that it has a large share 
in the commerce of the Pacific. Its chief exports are wheat 
and lumber. 

Puget Sound, a southern extension of the canal coast (Fig. 
151) of the Alaskan province, is remarkable for the complexity 
of its branches, and depth of 
water. It extends southward 75 
miles from the Strait of Fuca and 
has a coast line of 2000 miles. 
Sites for seaports are numerous, 
but Seattle (330,000) and Tacoma 
(108,000) are the only large cities. 
Seattle controls the Alaskan trade 
and has increased its population 
194 per cent in a decade, while 
Tacoma has increased 1 24 per cent. 
The Puget Sound ports are reached 
by four transcontinental lines from Fig " 333 " ~ Puget Sound - 

the east, and are nearer to Japan and Ghina than San Francisco. 
Their annual foreign trade is about $5,000,000. 

Los Angeles (475,000) is the metropolis of the tropical fruit 
region of southern California. While the main part of the city 
is inland, it has a narrow extension that reaches to the coast on 
San Pedro Bay, where a natural harbor has been recently im- 
proved. Directly east of it the low San Gorgonio pass admits 
the Southern Pacific Railway. It is one of the most prosperous 
and enterprising cities in the United States (Fig. 87) and has 
increased its population 211 per cent in a period of ten years. 

The opening of the Panama Canal has stimulated to a degree 
difficult of estimation the already rapid economic development 
of the Pacific provinces. 




418 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

The Chilean Province. — The narrow strip in South America west of 
the Andes and between 30 and 40 S. Lat. is in many ways a counter- 
part of the Californian province. Most of the rain falls in winter and 
varies from 60 inches in the south to 10 inches in the north. A low 
coast range and a narrow valley between it and the Andes complete the 
resemblance to California. This province is agricultural and contains 
the bulk of the population of Chile. The products are grain, fruit, and 
cattle. Santiago (408,000), the capital and largest city, is situated in the 
central valley, about 100 miles from its seaport, Valparaiso. 

The Cape Province. — The southeast extremity of Africa in Cape 
Colony enjoys a climate in which the range of temperature is scarcely 
more than ten degrees and most of the 30 inches of rain falls in winter. 
The province has a peculiar flora rich in showy flowering plants, many of 
which have been transplanted to European gardens. The agricultural 
products are wheat, corn, wine, and tobacco. Cape Town (78,000), on 
Table Bay, is the metropolis of South Africa and an important port and 
naval station on the sea route to Australia and the Orient. 

The Southwest Australian Province. — The southwest coast lands of 
Australia are exposed in winter to cyclonic winds which bring a rainfall 
of from 20 to 30 inches, while the summers are dry. The vegetation 
varies from forests of gigantic eucalyptus trees to steppe and thorn 
scrub. Nearly all grains, root crops and fruits are grown, but sheep 
raising and cattle raising are the most important industries. Perth is 
the seaport for the rich gold fields of the interior (p. 411), and Adelaide 
(192,000) is the commercial Jand political center of a large agricultural 
and grazing district. 

The Mediterranean Province is discussed in Chapter XXXI. 



CHAPTER XXVIII 

THE PEOPLE OF THE UNITED STATES AND CANADA 

With the exception of the French on the lower St. Lawrence, 
the people of the United States and Canada were originally of 
almost pure British stock. The period of active immigration 
and permanent settlement extended from 1607 to about 1750. 
They then increased by natural excess of births over deaths 
to about 14,000,000 in 1830. Shortly after 1830 immigration 
began on a large scale, and with some fluctuations has increased 
until the present, when in some years a million aliens land upon 
American shores. The total number amounts to about3o,ooo,ooo, 
of which 90 per cent have come from Europe. 

Previous to 1890, 75 per cent of the immigrants were Baltic 
and Teutonic people from the British Isles, Germany, and 
Scandinavia. Since 1890, 60 per cent have been Alpine and 
Mediterranean people from Italy, Austria-Hungary, and Russia, 
including many Slavs and Jews. This change in character of 
the immigrants, and the influx of people who differ widely from 
the original stock in temperament, habits, language, and re- 
ligion, make the problem of assimilation and blending into a 
homogeneous people a serious one. The matter is made more 
difficult by the tendency of the later immigrants to segregate 
in great cities like New York and Chicago, and to maintain 
there their own peculiar habits of life. The most efficient agent 
of Americanization is the public school, where the children 
learn the English language, absorb American ideas, and un- 
dergo a change even in the form of their heads. Many of the 
Slavs and Hungarians go inland to work in the coal mines and 
steel mills, while the Italians build railroads, streets, sewers, and 
aqueducts, and perform all sorts of unskilled labor. The Alpine 

419 



420 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

peoples are noted for their domestic virtues and devotion to 
family, divorce being almost unknown among them. The 
Italians have a native talent and passion for art and music. 
These are qualities in which the typical American is often lack- 
ing, and are desirable contributions to the society of the future. 

The colored people, descendants of former slaves, have occu- 
pied the field of labor in the southern states almost to the ex- 
clusion of foreigners. They are most numerous in the " black 
belt " from South Carolina to Louisiana, where in many com- 
munities they outnumber the whites. Their number in pro- 
portion to the total population is decreasing. 

Of the 92,000,000 people in the United States, 11.1 per cent are 
colored and 14.5 per cent foreign-born. The native whites of 
native parents form only 53.8 per cent of the whole. The Amer- 
icans are certainly destined to be a composite and cosmopolitan 
people. The proportion of urban population living in towns of 
2500 or more has increased from 40.5 per cent in 1900 to 46.3 per 
cent in 19 10. Many rural districts lost population in the decade 
1900 to 1910. This is true of the whole state of Iowa. It is 
an indication and result of the improvement of farm machinery 
and the development of manufactures and transportation. At 
the same time the movement from the country to the city re- 
tards the progress of agriculture, upon which all industry and 
prosperity depend, diminishes the food supply in relation to 
demand, and increases the cost of living. 

Distribution of Population. — The chief natural conditions 
which control density are: (1) rainfall, no state wholly west of 
the 20-inch line having a density above 15 except Washington; 
(2) arability, states of the next higher ranks having productive 
glacial or other soils; (3) coal, iron, and the Great Lakes, which 
give the states enjoying them a rank next to the highest; (4) 
the Atlantic seaboard, which in combination with (3) renders 
possible a density approaching that of the leading countries of 
the Old World. The density of population decreases in every 
direction from the vicinity of the metropolis, but not uniformly. 



PEOPLE OF THE UNITED STATES AND CANADA 



421 



The decrease is slowest westward parallel with the path which 
the center of population has traveled from near Baltimore in 
1790 to central Indiana in 1 910 (Fig. 313). 




Fig. 334. — Density of population in the United States and Canada. 

Future Population. — In spite of increased immigration, the 
rate of increase of population has decreased from 3.64 per cent 
per annum in 1810 to 2.1 per cent in 1910. Allowing for a 
similar decrease in the future, the probable population of the 
United States in the year 2000 has been estimated at 250 to 
350 millions. The possible capacity of the United States to 
support population is affected by many factors, among which 
utilizable water and the standard of living are the chief. As 
the latter may vary, the country may sometime contain from 
500 to 1000 million people. 

The population of Canada has grown by natural increase and 
British immigration to more than 7,000,000, of which 23 per 
cent retain the language and customs of their French ancestors. 
One fifth of the native-born Canadians are living in the United 
States. On account of the unknown possibilities of a large part 
of the country, its future growth and development are difficult 



422 



REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 



to calculate, but that they will be large is certain. The climate 
will exclude south Europeans, and Baltic civilization will expand 
northward. 






LEGEND 
Absolut© Forest Land 
Intermediate between Agrf&ultura 
and Forest Land 
.IturaJ Land 
26V E=^ Gra z i ng Land 

100* To+a) 




Fig. 335. — Probable future use of land. (17.5. Forest Service.) 



PEOPLE OF THE UNITED STATES AND CANADA 423 

The people of the United States and Canada have fallen heir 
to the largest fortune in unoccupied land and undeveloped re- 
sources that ever fell to the lot of any historic people. They 
are even now only beginning to understand how large it is. 
The sense of unbounded and inexhaustible wealth tends to 
foster an extravagant spirit which is the source of their greatest 
danger. Scientific utilization and conservation of all resources 
will extend the existence of one or more great nations in tem- 
perate North America through uncounted centuries. 




4 2 4 



CHAPTER XXIX 

THE WEST EUROPEAN PROVINCE 

Physiographic Provinces of Europe. — The Baltic peneplain, 
invaded by the White Sea, has a structure and relief almost iden- 
tical with those of the Laurentian peneplain (pp. 45, 118), in- 
vaded by Hudson Bay. The Scandinavian highland corresponds 
substantially with the plateau and coast mountains of Labrador. 
The Interior and Baltic-Black plains of Europe are quite similar 
to the Interior plain of North America. The Western province 
of Europe, a complex assemblage of broken blocks, some de- 
pressed and some elevated (p. 63), with vestiges of old folded 
mountains and including the British Isles, is homologous with 
the Appalachian highland, including Newfoundland. The Medi- 
terranean region, with its folded, curved, and branched moun- 
tain ranges, volcanoes, peninsulas, islands, and sunken sea 
basins, resembles the Caribbean ranges in structure more than 
maps alone can show. By cutting out the Gulf of Mexico with 
its coastal plain and moving the Caribbean ranges northward 
to the border of the continent, the geographic correspondence 
between Europe and North America east of the Rocky Moun- 
tains becomes very striking. 

Climates. — ■ The climates of the European provinces have 
been previously described (pp. 218-221), and may be briefly 
characterized as Atlantic, continental, and Mediterranean. 
The Atlantic climate is temperate and moist. The small range 
is due especially to mild winters. The rainfall is generally 
above 30 inches and almost perennial, with a small excess in 
autumn and winter. The continental climate is extreme and 
dry. The range is large; a long, cold winter in the north and 

425 



426 



REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 



a long, hot summer in the south overlapping midway. The 
rainfall is generally less than 30 inches, with a large excess in 
summer. The Mediterranean ' climate is hot, with a wet and 
temperate winter. The rainfall varies with exposure, being 
above 30 inches on western coasts and slopes, and below 30 
inches on eastern. 




H|S 30 to no Inches. 

More Than GO inches. 



Fig- 337- 



Natural Provinces of Europe. — Those portions of Europe 
which are more than sparsely populated (Fig. 236), and which 
are occupied by the leading nations of the world, lie, with trifling 
exceptions, in provinces of the Oregon, Californian, and Missis- 
sippian types. On account of differences in the position and 
trend of mountain ranges, the arrangement and relations of the 



WEST EUROPEAN PROVINCE 



427 




Fig. 338. 

European provinces differ from those of the American. The 
Mediterranean (Californian type) province is sharply separated 
on the north from the West (Oregon type) and Central (Mis- 
sissippian type) European provinces, by an almost continuous 
system of east-west mountain ranges. The absence of north- 
south ranges permits the climatic conditions of the West prov- 
ince to extend eastward with very gradual change to the Central. 
Natural and Human Divisions. — In contrast with North 
America, occupied by only three great political units, Europe, 
with two fifths the area, was in 1 914 divided among some twenty 
rival states. Of these thirteen have survived the World War 
without loss of territory. The rest have been more or less 
broken up, with the formation of ten new states. The new 
political division has been made, as far as possible, according 
to community of racial type, language, and religion. Figure 339, 
and the table on page 429, show how far this plan has been 
carried out. 



428 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

In the West province, Great Britain, France, and Germany- 
have long led the world in industry, commerce, wealth, science, 
literature, and political power, with no formidable rival previous 
to the recent expansion of the United States. Switzerland, 
Belgium, the Netherlands, and Denmark are of minor impor- 
tance only because of small territory and population. The Bal- 
tic racial type and the Teutonic languages — English, German. 
Dutch, Danish, and Swedish — prevail except in France, where 
there is a large admixture of Alpine and Mediterranean stocks, 
and French, the most important of the Romanic languages, is 
spoken. 

The Central province is occupied by Russia, Roumania, Bul- 
garia, and the new states of Poland, Ukraine, Czechoslovakia, 
Jugoslavia, Hungary, Austria, and other fragments of former 
empires. The people are largely of the Alpine type and speak 
a great variety of Slavic languages. There are many Germans 
in the western part, and the Roumanians speak a Romanic 
language. 

The Mediterranean province includes mainly Italy, Spain, Por- 
tugal, and Greece. The people are nearly all of the Mediterranean 
type. Italian, Spanish, and Portuguese are, like French, 
Romanic languages, derived from the ancient Latin. In Greece 
a modification of ancient Greek is spoken. The Turks are 
Asiatic Mongolians and speak a language very different from 
those of genuine Europeans. 

The British Isles 

Between 50 and 6o° N. Lat., the continental shelf of western 
Europe projects far out to sea (Figs. 16, 336) and bears upon its 
surface a group of two large and many small islands. Sepa- 
rated from the mainland by the English Channel, a shallow 
strait from 100 to 21 miles in width, they are almost penin- 
sular rather than insular. They stand in front of the Baltic 
entrance and the mouth of the Rhine, and command the 



WEST EUROPEAN PROVINCE 



429 














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Total Slavs 162,400,000 

LANGUAGES NOT 
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Lithuanians . 3,500,000 
Letts 2,000,000 

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Catholic, and Mohammedan 


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Poles 17,1 

Czechs 5,6 

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Ruthenians . . 3,5 

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Serbians .... 9, 
Croats 2, 

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10 Longitude West Longitude East 10 from Greenwich 



43° 



43 2 



REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 



seaways of the north Atlantic, including the shortest routes 
to America. In area Great Britain is slightly larger than Ohio 




Fig. 340. — Physiographic regions of the British Isles. 

and the southern peninsula of Michigan, while Ireland is slightly 
smaller than Indiana. Great Britain faces Europe with a low 
and smooth coast belt, but presents to the Atlantic a highland 



WEST EUROPEAN PROVINCE — BRITISH ISLES 



433 



broken by gaps. The hilly southwestern peninsula and the 
Welsh mountains are separated by the Bristol Channel. Be- 
tween Wales and the Pennine range the " midland gap," 50 miles 



TEMPERATURE 

AND 

ANNUAL RAINFALL 

OF THE 

BRITISH ISLES 

SCALE OF MILES 




Fig. 341. — Climate of the British Isles. 



wide, is a great highway of travel. The Scotch highlands are 
broken across by the rift valley of the Clyde and the Forth. 

The island is especially rich in drowned valleys and tidal 
estuaries which penetrate the interior, bringing great seaports 



434 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

near together in pairs. London and Bristol are no miles apart. 
Liverpool and Hull are separated by the same distance, while 
Glasgow is only 40 miles from Edinburgh. There is no point 
in the island as much as 100 miles from the sea. Nature has 
planned it for a center of maritime commerce and sea power. 

Physiography and Economics. — The physiographic regions 
of the British Isles are shown in Fig. 340. 

The Scotch Highlands are a faulted and glaciated plateau of crystalline 
rocks, of about 3000 feet in elevation, dissected by narrow valleys con- 
taining many beautiful " lochs." It is a region of rugged heights, barren 
moors, and grass- and heather-clad slopes, given up to cattle and sheep 
pastures and game preserves, with a few farms in the valleys. There 
are no towns and few railroads, except along the east coast, where a nar- 
row lowland and the North Sea fisheries support most of the population. 
It is rich in wild and picturesque scenery which attracts thousands of 
tourists. 

The Rift Valley Lowland, about 50 miles wide, studded with 
many protruding ridges and " craigs " of volcanic rock, has 
very productive land in the valleys of the Tay, Forth, and Clyde. 
Its chief source of wealth lies in beds of coal and iron, and its 
facilities for ocean commerce, which make it a manufacturing 
and trading district of dense population. The business center 
is Glasgow (1,1 11,000), made a first-class seaport by the improve- 
ment of the Clyde, and engaged largely in steel ship building 
and sugar refining. Edinburgh (334,000), the ancient capital 
of Scotland, " the Athens of the north," built upon and around 
three volcanic craigs, is famous for its picturesque site, streets, 
and buildings, its law courts and ancient university. 

The Southern Uplands and Pennine Range are not high enough 
to present a serious barrier to the passage of railroads and canals. 
They are well fitted for sheep raising and general farming in the 
valleys; but the coal fields on both flanks of the Pennines are 
far more important. The presence of coal and iron, and the 
shipping facilities on two seas, here form the natural basis upon 
which has developed the greatest manufacturing district of the 



WEST EUROPEAN PROVINCE — BRITISH ISLES 



435 



world. The western slope, accessible for supplies of American 
cotton through the ports of Liverpool (747,000) and Manchester, 
is devoted to cotton spinning 
and weaving, carried on in 
many large towns, of which 
Manchester (715,000) is the 
commercial center. On the 
eastern slope Bradford 
(289,000) and Leeds (446,- 
000) are the centers of 
great woolen manufactures; 
and farther south, Notting- 
ham (260,000) and Leices- 
ter (227,000) manufacture 
fine hosiery, ribbons, and 
silks. Sheffield (469,000) 
has a world-wide reputation 
for cutlery. Near an out- 
lying coal field in the mid- 
land gap, Birmingham 
(870,000), " the Pittsburgh 
of England," produces rail- 
road rails, armor plate, 
structural steel, and iron goods of many kinds. The concen- 
tration of industries and population is so great that the " black 
country " contains about 8,000,000 people. In the north of 
England on the east coast, the towns on the Tyne and Tees 
have coal and iron and do a large business in iron smelting and 
the building of steel ships. 

The Central Lowland furnishes easy routes of transportation between 
ports and industrial centers on three sides of England. 

The Lake District, in northwestern England, resembles the Scotch high- 
lands, and is even more famous for beauty of scenery (Fig. 119). The 
Welsh Mountains repeat most of the features of the Scotch highlands ex- 
cept the lochs. The anthracite coal field on their southern coast is a 




Fig. 342. — Coal fields of Great Britain. 



436 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

great smelting district for iron, copper, tin, and other ores from many 
foreign sources. Cardiff (182,000) and Swansea (115,000) are the princi- 
pal ports. 

The Southeast Lowland. — A line drawn from the mouth of 
the Severn to the mouth of the Tees, with a curve toward the 
east, divides Great Britain into two contrasted parts. The 
region on the northwest contains all the highlands and most of 
the coal and iron, and is given up to manufacturing industries 
on the largest scale. The region on the southeast is a lowland 
varied by gentle hills and rolling downs, and is largely agri- 
cultural. Wheat, oats, hay, and turnips are the principal crops. 
Cattle, horses, and sheep of the finest varieties are bred. Near 
the south coast, apple orchards, hop yards, and vegetable, 
fruit, and flower gardens flourish. A large portion of the area 
is occupied by the parks and country estates of the wealthy, 
who maintain them solely for beauty and pleasure. Bristol 
(357,000), Southampton (120,000), and Portsmouth (231,000) are 
important ports, especially for American trade. Hull (278,000) 
is the center of the North Sea fisheries. 

London. — The metropolis of the world now numbers over 
7,250,000 people. Situated at the head of tide water on the 
Thames, it is more convenient for European trade than for 
American. At present it holds a rank near the first among 
seaports. From the Norman walled city of the eleventh century, 
about one mile in diameter, it has grown in all directions, ab- 
sorbing town and country, until now it covers an area extend- 
ing 5 to 10 miles from the original center. The old town, 
locally known as " the City," is now given up to official and 
financial business, and has a permanent population of only about 
30,000. Probably 1,000,000 people may be found there during 
business hours. It contains the general post office, the Bank of 
England, the stock exchange, the Mansion House or residence 
of the Lord Mayor, the Guildhall, St. Paul's Cathedral, the 
Norman fortress called the Tower, Billingsgate fish market, 
St. Bartholomew's Hospital, and many other famous buildings. 



WEST EUROPEAN PROVINCE — BRITISH ISLES 



437 



London is rather sharply divided into an " east end " and a 
" west end." East London is the seaport, largely occupied by 
docks, warehouses, markets, factories, and the appurtenances 
of trade on a large scale. It is also the home of about a million 
paupers, who seldom see a day in which they have enough to 
eat. West London is the home of aristocracy and wealth, where 




Fig- 343— London. 

another million live in luxury. The south side of the Thames 
is neither pauper nor aristocratic, but is occupied by people of 
moderate means. The center of the west end is the formerly 
distinct city of Westminster, the seat of government and re- 
ligion and the real capital of the British Empire. West London 
contains the Houses of Parliament, Buckingham Palace (the 
town residence of the sovereign), Westminster Abbey, where the 
sovereigns are crowned, the government offices, the law courts, 
museums, art galleries, theaters, hotels, club houses, many 
palatial public and private buildings, and the fashionable retail 
shopping district. In the midst of it Hyde Park, Regents Park, 



438 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

and other smaller parks occupy large spaces devoted to outdoor 
recreation and pleasure. 

London is governed by a legislative and executive body 
known as the London County Council. The movement of the 
people is effected by lines of surface cars and an extensive sys- 
tem of underground electric railways. The thousands of omni- 
buses and cabs in use a few years ago are now to some extent 
displaced by autocars. London is one of the greatest railway 
centers of the world. Trunk lines enter from all sides, and sta- 
tions of the largest capacity receive and discharge passengers. 
London is the financial center of the world, where bonds, stocks, 
notes, bills, checks, drafts, coin, paper money, and securities of 
all kinds from every part of the world find a market. 

London is a world by itself, which may be analyzed and 
roughly divided into many cities occupying to a greater or less 
extent the same territory, as follows: 

i. Marine London, including all persons employed in shipping 
by water and in handling and storing goods. 

2. Manufacturing London, including all persons employed 
in any capacity in manufacture. 

3. Mercantile London, including all wholesale and retail 
merchants and their employees. 

4. Financial London, comprising all persons who deal in 
public and private securities, and are engaged in banking and 
brokerage. 

5. Official London, comprising all those engaged in the ad- 
ministration of imperial, royal, and municipal government. 

6. Social London, made up of people of many classes, who 
live there because of the social, educational, and artistic advan- 
tages. 

7. Professional and servile London, comprising all those who 
render personal service by caring for the health, property, 
welfare, and comfort of the population. 

8. Pauper London, comprising a large number of people who 
have no regular or visible means of support. 



WEST EUROPEAN PROVINCE — BRITISH ISLES 439 

Ireland, "the Emerald Isle," so called because of perennial greenness 
due to the mildness and humidity of its climate, consists of a central plain 
with highlands around the borders. It is very poor in mineral resources, 
and peat is the common fuel. The peasants raise potatoes, pigs, and 
dairy cattle. Flax is grown in the north, from which the famous Irish 
linen is manufactured at Belfast (393,000). Cork has an excellent harbor 
on the south coast, and its port of Queenstown is a place of landing for 
American passengers and mail. The population of Ireland has been 
decreasing for more than a century by emigration, chiefly to the United 
States. 

Economic Conditions. — Little more than a century ago the 
British were an agricultural and pastoral people numbering 
about 9,000,000. The progressive utilization of their mineral 
resources has been the chief factor in an increase of population 
to 45,000,000, of which 70 per cent are engaged in manufactures 
and commerce and only 12 per cent in agriculture. The popu- 
lation of England and Wales is 36,000,000 giving a density of 
634 to the square mile. Of these 78 per cent live in cities. Of 
the area 41 per cent is pasture, 32 per cent arable, and 11 per 
cent occupied by roads and buildings. If the islands could be 
blockaded so as to cut off foreign food supplies, the stock on 
hand would last but a few months, and half the population 
would suffer from hunger in a short time. The mills of Great 
Britain spin one fifth of all cotton grown and supply more than 
half of all cotton goods exported. One fourth of the world's wool 
clip is manufactured there. In production of iron and steel 
it stands next to the United States. In exports of manufactured 
goods it leads all countries. Its total foreign trade amounted 
in 1916 to the enormous sum of $7,400,000,000. 

Such an economic condition demands a world-wide market and a great 
merchant marine. The market is found largely in the colonies and depend- 
encies which form the British Empire, of which India, Egypt, Canada, 
Australia, and South Africa are the most important. The tonnage of all 
merchant vessels carrying the British flag is nearly half the total of the 
world. British ships not only carry away manufactured goods and bring 
home foodstuffs and raw materials, but do a large part of the carrying 



440 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

business of other countries, especially of the United States. Such a fleet 
requires protection ; hence the British navy about equals in fighting strength 
those of France and the United States combined, and holds the empire 
of the seas. The success of this vast scheme requires the possession of 
coaling and repair stations on the high seas and open trading ports on all 
coasts. Hence many of the " keyholes " and " crossroads " of the world 
are British. Gibraltar, Malta, Suez, and Aden command the Mediter- 
ranean-Suez route; Singapore and Hongkong the trade of the China seas; 
Cape Town, Mauritius, and Ceylon the Indian Ocean; Halifax, Bermuda, 
Barbados, and Jamaica the western Atlantic; and many islands in the 
Pacific are British. Thus " Britannia rules the waves." 

The British people have acquired great wealth from profits on raw 
materials imported, manufactured, and exported, from profits on goods 
imported, repacked, and distributed abroad, from the carrying business 
done by sea for other people, and from banking and exchange. The 
capital thus accumulated is largely invested abroad in bonds of various 
governments, and the stocks of industrial enterprises. The geographic 
basis of British power and prosperity lies in a unique combination of con- 
ditions: (i) the position and coast line of the British Isles, which furnish 
unequaled advantages for foreign trade; (2) the "silver streak" of water 
which has protected the country from foreign invasion for eight hun- 
dred years; (3) the complex structure. of the land, accompanied by low 
or moderate relief; (4) the mild, moist, and equable climate; (5) the large 
supply of coal and iron. The first four are permanent; the fifth is tempo- 
rary, and is liable to become seriously impaired within the present century. 

World Power. — The British people have exerted a greater 
influence upon the world than any other since the fall of the 
Roman Empire. This is due to their stable and enlightened 
government, free and democratic institutions, mechanical and 
inventive skill, success in war, shrewdness and integrity in 
trade, rapid increase in numbers, and their colonizing policy. 
British civilization now prevails over one third of the habitable 
globe, and the English language is spoken by one tenth of the 
human species, more in America than in the Old World. 

France 

France would extend from the Ohio River to the Gulf of 
Mexico and cover the area of Kentucky, Tennessee, Alabama, 



WEST EUROPEAN PROVINCE — FRANCE 



441 



Georgia, and Florida north of the 30th parallel. It is a "bridge " 
country, lying between the Mediterranean and the Atlantic 
and connecting the central plateaus of Europe with the Iberian 
peninsula. Its position between two seas, with ample coast 
line on both, gives it commercial advantages scarcely second 
to those of Great Britain. 

Coast Features. — France is bounded by mountains and seas 
except on the northeast. The coast opposite England is a 
chalk cliff (Fig. 128), but several artificial ports accommodate 
the large transit between the two countries. A tunnel twenty 
miles long under the Strait, of Dover is a proposition seriously 
maintained by engineers. Havre, at the mouth of the Seine, 
has been prepared by elaborate harbor works to receive the 
shipping too large to go up the river. Cherbourg is a port of 
call for steamships to and from British, Dutch, and German 
ports. The granite upland peninsula of Brittany has many small 
harbors frequented by fishing vessels. St. Nazaire and Nantes 
on the Loire are important maritime marts, while Bordeaux 
(262,000) on the Garonne is the port of the southern wine dis- 
trict. Between the Gironde and the Pyrenees a remarkably 
straight and smooth belt of bars, lagoons, and dunes preclude 
access from the sea. On the south coast, Marseilles (551,000), 
commanding the outlet of the Rhone valley, is the principal 
seaport on the Mediterranean and the second city of France. 

Relief and Drainage. — Apart from the boundary mountains, 
the highland of France lies in the south, where the plateau of 
Auvergne occupies an oval area about half as large as Tennessee. 
It is a broken and tilted block, bounded on the east by a steep 
escarpment known as the Cevennes Mountains, and sloping 
westward halfway to the Atlantic. Its surface is studded with 
hundreds of puys, or volcanic cones (Fig. 53). The Cevennes 
are continued northward by a lower escarpment which curves 
to the east and joins the Vosges at the head of the Saone-Rhone 
valley. West and north of these highlands a somewhat undu- 
lating plain extends to the coast, parted by low divides into the 



442 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

basins of the Seine, Loire, and Garonne. In the northeast a 
narrow area is drained by the Meuse and Moselle to the Rhine. 
Physically distinct from the rest of France, the Saone-Rhone 
valley opens a broad highway from the Mediterranean north- 
ward to the gate of Belfort, where a gap in the highlands gives 
easy passage to the Rhine at Basel. In the extreme south, 
the gate of Carcassonne connects the Mediterranean with the 
Garonne basin. 

Climate and Agriculture. — The climate of the French low- 
lands is everywhere mild and genial, with little frost and a mod- 
erate rainfall. The peninsula of Brittany is cloudy and foggy, 
with no frost and a perennial vegetation. It furnishes dairy 
products, small fruits, and flowers for the London and Paris 
markets. Most of the people live near the coast and are en- 
gaged in sardine fishing. From north to south the number of 
rainy days decreases, and the warmth and dryness of the sum- 
mer increase. In the basins of the Seine and Loire large crops 
of wheat, barley, and sugar beets are grown. Orchards, vine- 
yards, and hop yards are extensive and profitable. The 
Garonne basin is famous for wine, tobacco, corn (maize), and the 
mulberry. The Mediterranean climate and products extend far 
up the Rhone valley, which is devoted to the culture of olives, 
oranges, almonds, figs, grapes, and the mulberry for feeding 
silkworms. The central plateau is bleak, wet, windy, and gen- 
erally unproductive except of pasture. 

Half the area of France is arable, and more people are engaged 
in agriculture than in any other industry or business. The land 
is cultivated in small plots and holdings, largely by hand labor, 
and in a very thorough and intensive manner. Stock is seldom 
turned out to pasture, but cattle and horses are kept by soiling 
with fresh fodder in stables. Hedges or fences of any kind are 
rare. There are no waste or untidy places, the roadsides and 
stream banks being fully utilized. The country resembles a 
well-kept garden. The French peasants are among the most 
industrious and thrifty people in the world. France leads all 



WEST EUROPEAN PROVINCE — FRANCE 443 

other countries in the production of wine, which has amounted 
in good years to 1,500,000,000 gallons. Much wine is imported 
from the United States, flavored with French wine, and reex- 
ported with French labels. The wheat crop of about 370,000,000 
bushels ranks third in the world, and is consumed at home. 
France produces one tenth of the beet sugar and one fifth of 
the raw silk used in the world. In variety and richness of 
agricultural products France is a highly favored country. 

Minerals and Manufactures. — In the extreme north an exten- 
sion of the Belgian coal field into France is a center of textile in- 
dustry in cotton, woolen, linen, hemp, and jute. Lille (2 18,000) is 
the chief city. France uses one fourth of all wool manufactured. 
Fine laces woven by hand and of fabulous value are produced 
around Valenciennes, Alencon, and other towns. Small coal 
fields in the Rhone valley made possible the establishment of the 
greatest silk and velvet industries in the world at Lyons (524,000) 
and St. Etienne, now carried on by hydroelectric power. They 
use one fifth of all raw silk manufactured. Coal and iron ore 
at Creusot in the northern part of the central plateau, and at 
Nancy and Verdun in the northeast, locate there the chief iron 
works. Grenoble in the southern Alps has water power and 
is the seat of the largest fine glove manufacture in the world. 
Limoges, on the western edge of the plateau, and Sevres, near 
Paris, are celebrated for fine china and porcelain, and Rouen for 
decorative glass. 

These manufacturing centers are surpassed in value of prod- 
uct by Paris, which makes a specialty of articles of luxury, or 
fancy goods. These include brandies, cordials, essences, per- 
fumes, paintings, clocks, mirrors, bronzes, gilt and inlaid fur- 
niture, jewelry, tapestries, carpets, millinery, ladies' dresses, and 
a great variety of articles which require and display artistic 
ability. The raw materials of such goods form a small part 
of their cost, and the profits are very large, because their high 
value lies in the beauty or attractiveness conferred by human 
skill. 



444 



REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 



Transportation. — The large rivers of France are all connected 
by canals and form an extensive system of navigated waterways. 
On account of the swift current, the Rhone is less available 
than the rest. One fifth of the total movement of goods is by 




.- — 5S /,' A L T I C S E A -jr I X KfiDfjBberg 



l.L.POA.T.ES CO., 



Fig. 344.— Waterways of Northwestern Europe. 



water. The 30,000 miles of railway are organized in five great 
systems radiating from Paris. Those from the north through 
Paris to the east and southeast form a part of transcontinental 
lines to Marseilles, Genoa, Brindisi, Constantinople, and all parts 
of the Mediterranean. 

Alsace-Lorraine. — In 191 9 Germany restored to France the 
province of Alsace-Lorraine, having an area about as large as 

Connecticut and Rhode Island 
and a population of 1,870,000, 
most of whom speak German 
but have French sympathies. 
Thus the territory of France is 
extended to the Rhine, but a 
more important change is the 
transfer to France of the iron 
deposits of Lorraine, the 
Fig. 345.— Pans. largest in Europe, from which 



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WEST EUROPEAN PROVINCE — FRANCE 445 

the Germans obtained three fourths of their ore. As reparation 
for coal mines destroyed in northern France, Germany also cedes 
to France the ownership of the mines of the Sarre basin adjoining 
Lorraine. These changes may compensate for the almost total 
destruction of the northern textile industries of France and give 
her a leading position in manufactures. 

Alsace contains rich deposits of potash and is the seat of cotton 
manufactures at Mulhouse and Colmar. The Rhine, now under 
international control, with numerous canals and railroads, makes 
this region a thoroughfare of communication between north and 
south and east and west. The principal cities are Strasbourg 
and Metz. 

Paris (2,888,000), situated at the point of convergence of large 
tributaries of the Seine, is the third city of the world in population. 
As the capital of the French republic, it exerts a greater influence 
in the government than does the capital in any other country. 
It is a seaport and a great manufacturing center, but its fame 
rests more upon its beauties than its industries. Beginning as 
a fishing village on a small island in the Seine, it was fortified 
because of its strategic importance at a river confluence and the 
crossing of great highways of travel. The inclosing walls have 
been repeatedly enlarged in circumference, and the city is still 
surrounded by a rampart, now used as a boulevard. In the last 
fifty years it has been systematically rebuilt, care being taken 
to use historic palaces, churches, and public buildings to the 
best advantage. Museums, art galleries, opera houses, hotels, 
cafes, parks, avenues, boulevards, bridges, arches, columns, 
fountains, statuary, and all the devices of urban architecture 
are combined on a scale of magnificence scarcely approached by 
any other city. These features, together with the resources for 
education and amusement, and the artistic display of the shops, 
attract visitors and residents from all parts of the world, and 
form a valuable economic asset. 

People. — On account of its " bridge " position, France has 
been the crossroads and meeting place of migrations for centuries, 



446 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

and the people are racially much mixed. They are prevail- 
ingly Baltic in the north, Alpine in the center, and Medi- 
terranean in the south. The number is now about 40,000,000 
and practically stationary, the increase in 40 years having 
been only 6 per cent. During that period, at peace under a 
republican government, they accumulated a greater wealth 
per capita than was possessed by any other people. In 191 6 
they imported foodstuffs and other materials worth above 
$5,000,000,000 and exported wine and manufactured articles, 
chiefly of silk and wool, amounting to $1,160,000,000. In 
foreign commerce and naval strength France stands third. In 
education and in artistic ability and products it is second to none. 

Colonies. — In area of foreign possessions France is second only to 
Great Britain, but they are far less valuable than the British. Algiers and 
Tunis are practically outlying parts of France. Most of west Africa 
from the Mediterranean to the Kongo, Madagascar, and eastern Indo- 
China are under French control and exploitation. 

Belgium 

In natural conditions, people, language, and industries, south- 
eastern Belgium is closely allied to northern France. It is a 
country of low hills, rich in coal, iron, zinc, and silver-lead, and 
dotted with mines and factories producing railway materials, 
firearms, machinery, glass, and chemicals. The inhabitants, 
called Walloons, speak French. Northwestern Belgium, or 
Flanders, is a marshy plain, little above sea level, and resembles 
Holland in being traversed by canals and protected by dikes. 
The inhabitants, called Flemings, speak a language differing little 
from Dutch. It is a center of extensive textile products of all 
kinds, of which Brussels carpets, Ghent linen, and Mechlin lace 
are the most noted. The soil of Belgium is generally productive 
and 60 per cent of the area is under cultivation in small farms. 
Cereal grains, potatoes, flax, and sugar beets are staple crops. 
Draft horses and dairy cattle are bred. Antwerp (321,000) on 



WEST EUROPEAN PROVINCE — GERMANY 



447 



the Scheldt is accessible by the largest steamships and is the first 
seaport in tonnage in Europe. The position of Belgium makes 
it a natural gateway for central Europe and insures a large trade 
in goods passing through. Brus- 
sels (650,000), the capital, re- 
sembles Paris on a small scale. 

At the outbreak of the World War 
Belgium was a hive of industry, with 
the greatest density of railway mileage 
and population in Europe. In an area 
smaller than Massachusetts and Con- 
necticut, it supported nearly 8,000,000 
people in comfort and prosperity. Dur- 
ing German occupation (1914-1918) it 
shared the fate of northern France. It 
was plundered of machinery and other 
movable property, many of its towns 
were destroyed, and large areas of its 
farm lands were laid waste. At the 
close of the war, Germany ceded to 

Belgium three small frontier districts and undertook obligations to repair a 
portion of the damages. With characteristic courage and industry, the 
Belgians are making good progress toward a restoration of their country 
to its normal condition. 

Belgium controls the Kongo State in central Africa, having a population 
of 15,000,000, and is developing its resources by means of railroads and 
waterways. 




Fig. 346. — Antwerp. 
River and canals shown in black. 



Germany 

Germany, with an area smaller than France, is by nature less 
favorably situated and endowed. The boundaries on the west 
and northeast are artificial, but in the south and southeast are 
mountainous. The Baltic and North sea coasts are bordered 
by barrier beaches and dunes, but broken by estuaries of great 
rivers. The Baltic plain has a glacial soil (Fig. 117), less fertile 
than that of the western lowlands, and includes large tracts of 
marsh and heath. The highlands south of the glacial boundary 



448 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

are a complex mosaic of low block plateaus, ridges, and basins. 
The principal ridges form an X, with a center at 50 N. Lat. and 
12 E. Long., and have peaks between 4000 and 5000 feet in height. 

Climate. — Germany lies on and beyond the eastern border 
of the West European province, and of Atlantic climate. It is 
a region of transition from oceanic to continental conditions, 
and the changes from west to east are marked. The North 
Sea ports are always open, while those of the Baltic are frozen 
from one to four months in the year. On account of the increase 
of elevation toward the south, the mean annual temperature 
is no higher at the foot of the Alps than on the Baltic shore. 
The warmest situations are in the southwestern valleys. Some 
of the western and southern slopes have a rainfall of 40 inches, 
but the average is less than 30 inches. 

Use of the Land. — Ancient Germany was heavily forested. 
Under scientific forestry regulation, one fourth of the area is 
still devoted to growing timber, about one third oak, beech, 
and other hard woods, and the remainder larch, pine, fir, and 
spruce. Half of the land is arable. Rye, oats, potatoes, and 
sugar beets are the staple crops of the Baltic plain ; wheat, 
barley, hops, grapes, and tobacco of the south. Rye is the 
common breadstuff. Germany leads the world in the produc- 
tion of potatoes and sugar beets. Potatoes serve not only for 
food but as a source of alcohol for fuel. Sugar and the famous 
Rhine wines are exported. Barley and hops go to make great 
quantities of beer, in brewing which Munich (595,000) is the 
leading city. Dairy cattle are bred in the lowlands, and sheep 
and horses on the highlands. Beet pulp from which the sugar 
has been extracted takes the place of corn in fattening hogs. 
Agriculture is highly scientific, and fertility is maintained by 
the use of artificial fertilizers, made from the slag of iron furnaces 
smelting phosphatic ore, potash salts mined at Stassfurt, and 
nitrate manufactured from air (p. 304). Nearly two fifths of 
the people are engaged in agriculture. Nevertheless there is an 
increasing importation of foodstuffs. 



WEST EUROPEAN PROVINCE — GERMANY 449 

Minerals and Manufactures. — The coal fields of Germany 
are small, but in conjunction with iron ores and water trans- 
portation are made efficient. The chief iron district is on the 
Ruhr, a small tributary of the lower Rhine, where the famous 
Krupp steel works are located at Essen. The same district 
contains textile centers, — for silk at Crefeld, for woolen at 
Aachen, and for wool, cotton, and linen at Barmen and Elberfeld. 
Mining and manufactures are not confined to the lower Rhine. 
The mines of the Hartz and Erzgebirge (ore mountains) yield 
lead, silver, and copper. Saxony, of which Dresden (547,000) 
is the capital, is a hive of industry in textiles, metals, sugar, and 
chemicals. Germany surpasses other countries in the manu- 
facture of chemicals, especially dyes from coal tar, medicines, 
electric apparatus, optical glass, and scientific instruments. 

Transportation. — The remarkable industrial development of 
Germany has been made possible by an improved system of in- 
land transportation, in which the waterways (Fig, 344) supple- 
ment the railways. All the great rivers traverse the blocks and 
ridges with little reference to present relief and are navigable 
nearly to their sources. The Rhine, Weser, and Elbe flow through 
the highlands and across the plain to the west of north. The 
Elbe, Oder, and Vistula are connected on the plain by a system of 
east-west cross valleys, the channels of ancient glacial drainage, 
which furnish easy routes for canals and railways. The river 
channels have been cleared, deepened, and straightened, the 
banks protected by masonry, and the natural routes connected 
by canals, providing in all over 8500 miles of waterway. As a 
great commercial highway from the Swiss frontier to the sea, 
the Rhine is now no less remarkable than for its picturesque 
scenery and romantic tradition. Cologne (516,000) is the prin- 
cipal German port on the river. There are 38,000 miles of 
railway, nearly all owned by the government and centering at 
Berlin. 

Foreign Commerce. — The Baltic ports, Danzig, Stettin, and 
Kiel, have been connected with the North Sea by the Kaiser 



45° 



REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 







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S3§| 



Wilhelm ship canal, 61 miles long, from Kiel to the mouth of the 
Elbe. Harbor improvements at Hamburg (p. 169) have made it 

the second greatest seaport on the 
continent and the third in the 
world, while Bremen holds second 
place in Germany. The total value 
of foreign commerce has amounted 
to more than $3,900,000,000 an- 
nually. The largest imports are 
foodstuffs and raw materials, 
mostly from the United States. 
Of the exports 70 per cent is manu- 
factured goods, of which Great 
Britain is the largest buyer. 
Cities. — There are twenty-three German cities of over 200,000 
inhabitants and seven of over 500,000, of which Berlin, with 
2,000,000, is first, and Hamburg, with 932,000, is second. 

Political and Social Conditions. — The German Republic 
consists of twenty-six federated states, of which Prussia is the 
largest. The population of about 60,000,000 gives a high 
density, amounting in Saxony to 820 to the square mile. To 
support such a population, it is necessary to make the most of 
the rather meager resources of the country, to maintain efficient 
industries and to extend foreign commerce. 



Fig. 347- — Hamburg. 

River and canals in black ; the free port is 

inclosed by dotted line. 



The Netherlands, Denmark, and Sweden 

The kingdom of the Netherlands, commonly called Holland 
(holtland, woodland), the delta land of the Rhine, Meuse, and 
Scheldt, about as large as the southeastern quarter of Louisiana, 
which it resembles, has reclaimed three eighths of its territory 
from the sea by building 1000 miles of dikes. The lands thus 
held are called polders, and are drained by constant pumping. 
The soil is very rich, and is used for meadows and dairy cattle, 
and for the culture of grain, potatoes, sugar beets, flax, and 



WEST EUROPEAN PROVINCE — NETHERLANDS 



451 



flowers. Gardens of tulips, dahlias, and hyacinths cover hun- 
dreds of acres. Half the land is pasture and one fifth sand 
dunes and heaths. The common fuel is peat. Many of the 
cities are built upon a foundation of piles made from timber 
floated down the Rhine. The means of internal communication 
are the most complete in the world. There are 3000 miles of 
navigable waterway, including 2000 miles of canals, 9500 miles 
of roadway, and 2000 miles of railway. On the canals barges 
are propelled by wind, animal, and human power. Many of 
the people live in boats. Wind power is used so extensively 
that Dutch domestic economy may be said to be based on wind 
and water. " God made the rest of the world, but man made 
Holland." 

The wealth and importance of Holland are due to its position 
commanding the trade of the Rhine and the Baltic plain. The 
Dutch were for centuries the 
chief distributors of Oriental 
goods to western Europe, and 
they now take toll both ways 
of goods in transit to and 
from Germany and Russia. 
Their great seaports of Rot- 
terdam (500,000) and Amster- 
dam (641,000) are connected 
with the ocean by ship canals. 
Amsterdam is built upon 90 
islands connected by 300 
bridges. The principal streets 
are double, with a canal in the middle, bringing land and water 
into the closest possible relations. Holland forms an insular 
base for over-sea traffic inferior only to Great Britain. 




Fig. 348. — The Netherlands. 






Foreign Possessions. — To the home country the Dutch East Indies 
form an appropriate and valuable annex. They include Java, Sumatra, 
Celebes, parts of Borneo and New Guinea, the Moluccas, and many other 
small islands, having an aggregate population of about 47,000,000. The 



452 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

Dutch are very successful in the management of the native peoples, in 
conducting with their aid plantations of sugar cane, coffee, cocoa, tea, 
rubber, tobacco, cinchona, and spices, and in mining tin. 

The 6,700,000 people of the Netherlands have a density of 
535 to the square mile, rising in some provinces to over 1000. 
Cooperation in creating and maintaining their land against the 
assaults of the sea has transformed a horde of fishermen and 
pirates into a highly prosperous and civilized people. The 
existence of this little kingdom in the midst and in the way 
of more powerful neighbors is made possible in part by the 
defensible nature of the country. Cutting the dikes would 
cover half the land with water too shallow for shipping and too 
deep for infantry and cavalry. Invasion would be possible 
only in the winter, when land and water are frozen. 

Denmark is a little larger than Holland, but has less than half the 
population. It comprises a peninsula and islands which command the 
entrance to the Baltic Sea. Its position accounts for its independence and 
neutrality, and for the commercial importance and population of its capital, 
Copenhagen (506,000). The land, once covered with beech forests, is poor, 
but in no other country has scientific dairy farming become so general and 
successful. Sugar beets are the chief crop, but most of the land is under 
grass and the principal exports are butter, eggs, and bacon. 

Sweden. — Most of the people of Sweden live in the southern part of 
the country, which is a lowland highly diversified by hills, lakes, marshes, 
eskers, and moraines. Forests of fir, pine, and beech cover the rougher 
parts and constitute an important source of wealth. Nine per cent of the 
total area of Sweden is under cultivation and supports more than half the 
population. The principal crops are oats, rye, and potatoes. Sweden is 
rich in minerals, especially iron, the deposits of ore at Gellivara, north of 
the Arctic circle, being among the largest and purest in the world. The 
notable exports are iron ore and metal, timber, furniture, wood pulp, 
paper, and matches. The natural waterways have been improved by 
canals and form a steamer route by way of the lakes, Wenner, Wetter, and 
Malar, through the heart of the country. The capital, Stockholm (413,000) , 
built on the islands and shores of Malar, is one of the most beautiful cities 
in Europe. 



CHAPTER XXX 

THE CENTRAL EUROPEAN PROVINCE 

Physiography and Climate. — The northern part of the Cen- 
tral European province lies upon the Interior and Baltic-Black 
plains, the southern among broken-block basins and folded 
mountains (Fig. 336). The prominent relief features are the 
eastern Alps, the Bohemian basin between the eastern arms of 
the X (p. 448), the Hungarian basin within the sickle-shaped 
curve of the Carpathians, the Roumanian basin between the 
Transylvanian Alps and the Balkans, and the mountainous 
plateau of the Balkan Peninsula. The plains portions contain a 
hydrographic center above 1000 feet, from which rivers flow 
northwest to the Baltic and southeast to the Caspian and 
Black seas. Among the latter is the Volga, the longest river 
in Europe. The southern portion is " Danube land," drained 
by the largest river in Europe to the Black Sea. The climate 
is continental and extreme, with a rainfall not much above or 
below 20 inches. In summer thunderstorms are frequent, and 
the winters are long, with persistent snow. 

Russia and Its Successors 

European Russia lies in the Arctic, Siberian, Central, and 
Interior provinces and extends over the Interior, Baltic-Black, 
and Caspian-Ob plains (Fig. 336). The area is about 1,600,000 
square miles and the population about 121,000,000. 

Soil and Vegetation. — More than half of Russia is covered 
with good glacial soil resembling that of the glacial plain of 
North America (Fig. 117). Near the margin of the glacial drift, 
and extending beyond it between the Volga and Dniester rivers 

453 



454 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

nearly to the Black Sea, is the " black earth " region, where the 
soil and vegetation resemble those of the American prairies. 
The northern half of Russia is covered by tundra and the great 
Siberian coniferous forest (Fig. 192). Southward the vegeta- 
tion changes successively to mixed forest, then summer forests 
of oak and ash, then a belt of prairie, passing finally into arid 
steppes around the Caspian Sea. The products are in the north 
almost exclusively timber and furs; in the cleared lands south 
of latitude 6o°, rye, oats, flax, and hemp; and on the black 
earth, wheat and sugar beets; while the treeless steppes are 
suitable only for grazing. Roughly, about one third of Russia 
is forest, one third arable, and one third grazing land. The 
Russian plain produces four fifths of the flax, three fifths of 
the hemp, half the rye, one fourth of the oats and barley, one 
fifth of the potatoes and sugar beets, and one sixth of the 
wheat of the world. It supports 20,000,000 horses, 30,000,000 
cattle, and 40,000,000 sheep and goats. Nine tenths of the 
people are employed in agriculture, but the methods are gen- 
erally primitive and the yields per acre small. The land is 
held in great estates by the nobility or by peasant communities, 
called mirs. Ignorance, poverty, and a state little above serf- 
dom prevail among the masses. 

Minerals and Manufactures. — Russia is rich in minerals. 
Gold, copper, and platinum are mined near the Urals. Coal and 
iron are abundant and occur near together in three districts, — 
in the east near the Ural Mountains, in the center south of 
Moscow, and in the south on the Donetz and Dnieper rivers. In 
the extreme southeast, on the shores of the Caspian, is one of the 
richest petroleum fields in the world (Fig. 288). Its burning 
springs have been held sacred by the Fire Worshippers for 
centuries. The iron industry is largest in the central and southern 
districts. Cotton is manufactured around Moscow and Petro- 
grad, and linen, hemp, and wool in many cities. The domestic 
supplies of timber, grain, sugar, and hides give rise to correspond- 
ing industries. Along the border of forest and prairie, leather is 



CENTRAL EUROPEAN PROVINCE — RUSSIA 455 

tanned with birch bark. Distillery and brewing products are 
of greater value than any other class of Russian manufactures. 

Transportation. — The Russian plain is so flat that drainage 
is poor, and much of it is marshy and liable to floods during the 
spring melting of snow. The fall of the rivers is slight, and they 
are consequently slow, shallow, and crooked. During several 
months of the year they are blocked by ice. Materials for 
road construction are scarce, and means of communication are 
everywhere inadequate. Winter, when land and water are 
solid, is the season of active movement of men and goods, by 
horse sledges. In spite of the difficulties, the great rivers are 
the principal highways, and are navigated to the total extent 
of 50,000 miles. Canals between the Volga and Neva connect 
the Baltic with the Caspian, and between the Vistula, Diina, 
and Dnieper connect it with the Black Sea. The Volga system 
is the most important waterway, but it does not give access to 
the open sea. A canal 40 miles long from the Volga at Tsaritsyn 
to the Don would remove this difficulty. A ship canal from 
the Baltic to the Black Sea is quite feasible and would repay a 
very large cost. Railway construction presents few difficulties, 
but the mileage is less than that of Germany, and the tonnage 
little more than that of France. Moscow and Petrograd are the 
principal railroad centers, and the network is closest in the 
agricultural region. Petrograd is the western terminus of the 
Siberian Railway, extending 5000 miles across Eurasia to the 
Pacific coast. It is a competitor of the American railways and 
of the Suez and Panama canals, for trade between the Orient and 
western Europe. 

Foreign Commerce. — Russia has no port on the high seas 
except Archangel and Alexandrovsk on the Arctic Ocean. The 
Baltic port of Petrograd (Fig. 349) has been artificially improved 
and is most important for trade with western Europe and 
America. On the Black Sea, Odessa is the chief port for ex- 
ports of wheat. Astrakhan, on the Caspian, is the center of 
important sturgeon fisheries. 



45 6 



REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 



Cities. — In Russia there are twenty-five cities of over 100,000 
inhabitants, of which Petrograd (2,133,000), Moscow (1,817,000), 

and Odessa (631,000) are 



tKOTLIN I. 

■JCronstadt 



P^tfOianieiihaum ~~ x ~~li'!>J e / 





Fig. 349. — Petrograd and vicinity. 



the largest. Petrograd 
was built by Peter the 
Great in the eighteenth 
century upon islands in 
the marshes of the Neva, 
in order to remove the 
capital from inland Mos- 
cow to a site on the 
Baltic. It is now the 
principal port, with a channel deepened to 20 feet. In winter 
powerful ice breakers are used to keep the harbor open. 

Asiatic Russia. — Russia has no foreign possessions, and does not 
need any, because of her vast contiguous Asiatic empire, sparsely inhabited 
and with plenty of room for expanding population. Siberia, Turkestan, 
and other Asiatic provinces have an area of 6,294,000 square miles and a 
population of 30,000,000. The area of the whole Russian Empire is nearly 
equal to that of North America, or more than one seventh of the land 
surface of the globe, and its population is one tenth of the human species. 

People. — Three fourths of the people of European Russia 
live in the Central European province, west of the Volga-Don 
and south of the Siberian railway. In the west there are many 
Germans and Jews, and in the east many Tatars and other 
Mongolian peoples. 

The backward state of civilization in Russia is due to several 
causes, all arising primarily from geographic conditions. The 
territory is continental and interior, shut in from stimulating 
contact with the sea (p. 158). The Urals and the Caspian form 
no effective barrier on the east, and the Russian plain is an 
extension of the great plains of Asia, from which successive 
waves of human invasion have swept westward. All the large 
rivers lead toward Asia or the Arctic and encourage intercourse 
away from the European and Atlantic centers of enlightenment. 



CENTRAL EUROPEAN PROVINCE — POLAND 457 

The vast forests and marshes, the scarcity of materials for road 
construction, and the severe winters enforce upon each com- 
munity an unfavorable degree of isolation. 

In 191 7 the tyrannical rule of the Czar was overthrown. The 
government fell into the hands of workmen's Soviets, or trade 
union councils, controlled by leaders who seem to be even more 
oppressive than the Czar. The nobility and people of wealth 
and education have been generally plundered or killed. The 
masses are illiterate and so ignorant that their struggle for liberty 
and justice is likely to be a long one. How much of the territory 
of the former Russian Empire will remain under Russian control 
is uncertain. Out of it several new and independent states have 
been erected or projected. 

Poland 

The old Kingdom of Poland, once a great power extending from 
the Baltic to the Black Sea, was divided more than a century ago 
between Russia, Prussia, and Austria. A territory about as 
large as Ohio, Indiana, and Kentucky, in which a majority of 
the population are Poles, numbering about 15,000,000, has been 
declared an independent republic. It stands between Germany 
and Russia and extends from the Carpathians to the Baltic. 
Its boundaries are not fully determined, but it certainly includes 
some of the most valuable provinces of the three former empires, 
— Russia, Germany, and Austria. Most of the country lies 
in the basin of the Vistula River, and while there are many lakes 
and marshes, the soil is as productive as any part of the Baltic 
Plain. The chief cereal crop is rye, while oats, potatoes, and 
sugar beets are extensively grown. Much of the land is held in 
large estates by German, Polish, or Russian owners and worked 
by poor Polish peasants. In the south, along the foot of the 
mountains, mines of coal and iron form the foundation for in- 
dustrial centers of the first rank. The southwest corner con- 
tains a system of mines and mills producing a variety of iron 
and steel wares. Not far away, cotton manufacture has made 



458 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

Lodz (500,000) grow as rapidly as some American cities. 
Warsaw (900,000), the old capital and chief railway center, is 
the seat of a variety of factory products, especially leather and 
sugar. Its university is an ancient center of learning. 

On the Baltic coast the German province of East Prussia is 
cut off from the rest of Germany by Polish territory. At the 
mouth of the Vistula, the German city of Danzig has been made 
independent, but its use by Poland as a seaport has been secured. 
The Poles have been subjected to the influence of west European 
culture and in intelligence, religion, and spirit resemble the 
French more than they do the Russians. The resources, in- 
dustries, and communications of Poland favor the maintenance 
of a strong and prosperous state. As a buffer between Russia 
and Germany, it holds a difficult position. The present popu- 
lation of about 25,000,000 may be doubled by annexation of 
adjoining Russian and Lithuanian territory. 

The Baltic States and Finland 

The eastern coastland of the Baltic formed a part of the old Russian 
Empire but is not occupied by Slavic people. In the south, adjoining 
Poland, the Lithuanians and Letts, numbering about 5,500,000, are de- 
scendants of a primitive Caucasian people not closely related to other 
Europeans. On both sides of the Gulf of Finland the Esths and Finns 
(about 4,000,000) are Mongolian peoples, allied to the Tatars and Turks. 
Of these regions Finland, in the Siberian natural province, is the most 
advanced and important. It lies on the Baltic Peneplain, is studded with 
low, rounded hills and lake basins, and is largely forested, resembling the 
region south of Hudson Bay (pp. 11 7-1 19, 342). The population is con- 
centrated near the coast and has been much modified in body and mind 
by Swedish blood and culture. Oats, potatoes, rye, and barley are raised. 
Horses and dairy cattle are bred. The most valuable products are timber 
and wood pulp. Abundant hydroelectric power favors textile mills and 
other mechanical works recently established. The people are thrifty and 
intelligent, Helsingfors (170,000), the capital, being the seat of a famous 
university. The Finns have never willingly submitted to Russian rule 
and have now established an independent republic about as large as 
Wisconsin and Michigan. 



CENTRAL EUROPEAN PROVINCE — UKRAINE 459 

The Baltic States, Lithuania, Letvia, and Esthonia, though now in- 
dependent, are weak and in an unsettled condition. They are not willing 
to submit again to Russian rule. The Lithuanians are equally unwilling 
to unite with Poland. The loss of these provinces is a severe blow to Russia, 
since it cuts off access to the Baltic Sea and Atlantic Ocean through the ports 
of Riga, Reval, and Libau, and leaves Petrograd, its only remaining Baltic 
port, on the extreme border of the state. 

Ukraine 

The oldest center of civilization in Russia is not Moscow but 
Kief (610,000), the holy city of the Ukrainians or Little 
Russians. These people, about 30,000,000 in number, occupy 
an area in southern Russia nearly as large as Texas. It includes 
a large part of the famous black earth region, " the granary of 
Europe," and produces most of the wheat exported through the 
port of Odessa (630,000). It is a smooth plain, green in spring 
and summer, a brown waste in autumn, and white with snow 
in winter. The villages extend along the streams where water 
is perennial. Windmills are everywhere used to grind grain. 
In the east the richest Russian coal and iron fields occur on the 
Donetz River. In the west the middle and upper classes are 
largely Polish and in the northeast Great Russian, and in the 
cities are many Jews. 

In 191 7 the Ukrainians set up an independent republic, which 
they have hardly been able to maintain against either the 
Germans or the Great Russians. A stable Ukrainian state 
would be one of the largest and strongest among the new nations 
of Europe. It would be as disastrous to Russia as the secession 
of the southern states would have been to the United States. 
A Russia cut off from the Black Sea and the Baltic would cease 
to be a European power and become practically Asiatic. 

The Successors of Austria-Hungary 

The former dual empire of Austria-Hungary contained an 
assemblage of races and languages as diversified as its physical 



460 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

features. It was held together chiefly by the personal power of 
the Hapsburg rulers and, as a result of their defeat in the World 
War, their " ramshackle empire " fell to pieces. The fragments 
have been reorganized on the basis of race and language and the 
new boundaries have been better adjusted to the physical 
features. 

Czechoslovakia. — The Czechs and Slovaks of the northern 
provinces of Austria-Hungary have shared with their Polish 
kinsfolk the advantages of long contact with western civilization 
and have acquired marked superiority to the East Slavs. They 
occupy the basin of Bohemia, the plateau of Moravia-Silesia, 
and the mountain region of the western Carpathians. Bohemia 
is a depressed block surrounded by a high rim and its dominant 
position between the Baltic Plain and the Danube valley has 
given it the name of " the citadel of Europe." The central 
plain is a land of rich, well-cultivated farms and orchards, noted 
for cereals, potatoes, sugar beets, hops, fruit, and bees. The 
highland rim contains almost every useful mineral, of which 
coal and lignite are the most valuable. Along the faulted margin 
of the block are numerous mineral springs, of which those at 
Karlsbad and Marienbad have a world-wide reputation. Mora- 
via and Silesia are natural counterparts of Bohemia, though some- 
what less highly favored. A dense and industrious population 
has developed an industrial life unsurpassed in central Europe. 
To the staple industries of iron, steel, textiles, and sugar has 
been added the manufacture of leather, paper, chemicals, and 
beer. Bohemian glass and porcelain have been famous for 
centuries. Bohemia is drained by the upper Elbe, which escapes 
through the mountain rim by the Saxon gate ; Moravia by the 
March southward to the Danube. These are the natural outlets 
for commerce. 

The people of these lands comprise about 6,000,000 Czechs, 
who are among the best educated people in Europe, and about 
3,300,000 Germans, who occupy solidly the mountain rim and 
form a large part of the town population. The Slovaks, a 






CENTRAL EUROPEAN PROVINCE — AUSTRIA 



461 



relatively backward, peasant people, numbering about 2,000,000, 
living in the Carpathian uplands and valleys, have united with 
the Czechs to form a Czechoslovak republic. This may also 
include 2,000,000 Ruthenians, or Little Russians, on the slopes 
of the middle Carpathians. The new state has an area a little 
larger than New York and a population of about 13,500,000, 
sparse in the mountains and very dense in the industrial districts. 
It is a vigorous, well-equipped nation, subject only to the com- 
mercial disadvantage of inland position, with trade connections 
through the territory of rival or hostile neighbors. The inter- 
nationalization of the Elbe, Oder, and Danube is designed to se- 
cure their free use by all nations. Prague (225,000), at the head 
of navigation on the Moldau, a branch of the Elbe, is the capital 
city, noted for its university, medical schools, and hospitals. 



Austria. — The new Austria, the heart of the old empire, is left almost 
without a body. It includes only the northeastern spurs and slopes of the 
Alps and the lowlands of the Danube 
valley in the Austrian gate between 
the Alps and Bohemia. It is a 
little larger than South Carolina 
and has a population of about 
6,500,000 Germans. Two thirds of 
it is mountainous and resembles 
closely in scenery and conditions 
of life the Alps of Switzerland 
(pp. 469-470). There are mines of 
lignite, iron, and other metals. The 
lowlands are similar to those of Bo- 
hemia. Vienna (about 2,000,000), at 
the intersection of roads and water- 
ways leading to the natural gates of 
" Danube land," has been the po- 
litical and commercial center of that region for a thousand years. Under 
the Hapsburgs, the city attained a wealth and magnificence scarcely sec- 
ond to those of Paris. Since its tributary area and population have been 
reduced to one eighth of their former dimensions, Vienna seems doomed to 
stagnation and decay. 




Fig. 350. — Vienna. 



462 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

Hungary. — The Hungarian Basin, the largest of the down-faulted 
blocks of Europe and about the size of Nevada, is walled in by the Car- 
pathians on the north and east, the Alps on the west, and a rugged plateau 
on the south. Its surface is so flat that the rivers are crooked, sluggish, 
and subject to overflow. The climate is continental and aggravated by 
the reduction of the rainfall to 20 inches or less. It is a treeless steppe, 
covered with tall grasses and flowers in spring, hot and dried up in summer 
and autumn and swept by cold winds in winter. The basin, with its sur- 
rounding slopes, is occupied by about 10,000,000 Magyars, or Hungarians, 
descendants of a Mongolian people who invaded Europe in the ninth 
century. More or less mingled with them on the borders and also forming 
solid enclaves, or distinct islands of population, are nearly as many Slavs, 
Roumanians, and Germans. About half the land is arable and seven tenths 
of the people are farmers. The country was given over to great herds of 
sheep and horses and both are still bred ; but as in the American steppe 
region, the grazing lands have been invaded by the plow until they have 
become one of the largest sources of corn and wheat in Europe. 

After the World War, territories occupied by large masses of Germans, 
Slavs, and Roumanians were included in other states and the area of the new 
Hungary was reduced to that of Indiana. The population of about 
8,500,000 is strongly Magyar with a considerable German element. Buda- 
pest (880,000) , a double city united by bridges across the Danube, is the 
capital and commercial center, noted for large flour mills. Its tributary 
area has been reduced to one fourth and its tributary population to one half 
their former magnitude. Like Austria, Hungary is now of less importance 
than its neighbors, having small resources, surrounded by unfriendly rivals, 
and with no outlets except through their territories. Like the Rhine, Elbe, 
Oder, and Vistula, the Danube has been internationalized and removed 
from control by any local power. The rapids at the Iron Gate are passed by 
a canal and the river is navigable to the German frontier. 

Roumania 

While the former great powers of Central Europe have been 
broken up by the World War, the area and population of Rou- 
mania have been more than doubled. The Roumanian people are 
quite distinct from the Slavs and Magyars who surround them, 
owing to descent from a body of Roman soldiers colonized on 
the lower Danube in the second century a.d. Their features, 



CENTRAL EUROPEAN PROVINCE — ROUMANIA 463 

language, customs, and name show their Italian origin. Their 
total number is about 13,000,000. Their homeland is the basin 
between the Balkans and the elbow of the Carpathians, an 
extension of the south Russian plain. Its alluvial soil, built 
up from the waste of the mountains, is even richer than the 
black earth. Hence Roumania is one of the granaries of Europe, 
producing crops of corn, wheat, barley, and oats comparable 
with those of Ohio. Beans, potatoes, sugar beets, and tobacco 
flourish, and the lower mountain slopes are planted with orchards 
and vineyards. A continuous petroleum field extends along 
the mountain front, making Roumania second to Russia in the 
production of European oil. The same area also contains coal, 
iron, copper, lead, and other minerals. The streams from the 
mountain canons furnish water power. The Roumanian is by 
inheritance a peasant farmer and herdsman and does not take 
kindly to machinery; hence manufactures are poorly developed. 

Driven back and forth by pressure from the Magyars, Turks, 
and Russians in turn, the Roumanians have spread eastward 
into Bessarabia, across the mountains into Transylvania, and 
westward over the edge of the Hungarian Plain. These terri- 
tories have now been added to the original Kingdom of Roumania, 
although they contain large enclaves of Magyar, German, and 
Turkish people. The mountains are generally covered with 
forests of oak, beech, and pine, and, besides supplying timber, 
support herds of goats, sheep, and swine. Transylvania is a 
plateau with level upland pastures and fertile open valleys. 
Bessarabia is adapted to grain, with high grade steppe pasture 
in the south. With a backbone of forested mountains rich in 
minerals, flanked on three sides by wide and fertile plains, few 
countries in the world possess such a balanced variety of surface 
and resources. 

Roumania commands the mouth of the Danube and the Black 
Sea ports of Galatz, Sulina, and Constantza. The capital, 
Bucharest (340,000), is proud of its title " the Paris of the East." 
Greater Roumania is about as large as New York, Pennsylvania, 



464 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

New Jersey, and Maryland, and has a population of about 
16,000,000. Protected from interference by more powerful 
neighbors, it is equipped to maintain a high degree of prosperity. 

The Balkan Peninsula 

The Balkan Peninsula forms a physical unit strongly con- 
trasted with the plains which bound it on the north. Few 
regions in the world possess a structure and relief so varied 
and confused. As a whole, it is a plateau broken into a large 
number of small elevated blocks and depressed basins and 
traversed by two main mountain ranges. On the western 
border the Dinaric Alps rise abruptly from the Adriatic. They 
are mainly a mass of porous limestone, into which the rainfall 
sinks, leaving the surface arid and bare. Drainage is generally 
underground and the lack of transverse valleys renders the region 
almost inaccessible from the sea. The precipitous coast is 
bordered by rocky islands, which have been compared to gnawed 
bones. In the east the Balkan mountains form a continuation 
of the Carpathian system, curving eastward from the Iron Gate 
to the Black Sea and sending a spur southward to the ,/Egean. 
Midway between these mountain systems, the valleys of the 
Morava and Vardar rivers form a continuous and easy passage 
from the Danube to the Gulf of Salonica, with a branch south- 
eastward to Constantinople, The Black Sea coast is smooth 
and without good natural harbors. The climate, vegetation, 
and agricultural products are continental, passing into Medi- 
terranean near the coast. 

The population of the Balkan Peninsula consists of people of 
diverse races, languages, and religions, mingled together in 
extreme confusion. The people of the town generally differ 
widely from those of the surrounding country. The inhabitants 
of neighboring villages are, in some cases, so unlike that they 
have nothing to do with each other. The original Slavic popu- 
lation was subjected for centuries to Turkish plunder, massacre, 



CENTRAL EUROPEAN PROVINCE — ALBANIA 465 

and misrule and, unable to act together, has suffered from 
political and social unrest. With relief from foreign oppression, 
an opportunity has come for self-government and national 
development. 

Jugoslavia. — The South Slavs of the former Austro-Hungarian provinces 
have united with those of Serbia and Montenegro to form a Serb-Croat- 
Slovene state, commonly known as Jugoslavia. Its territory includes the 
western plateau and mountains and a part of the Hungarian Plain. It 
is about four fifths as large as Roumania and has a population of about 
11,000,000, of which seven tenths are Slavic. The plateau portion is a 
•land of wooded hill pastures and fertile river valleys, industriously tilled 
by hardy farmers, although their methods are rather primitive. The 
staple crop is corn, but the other cereals are important. Orchards of plums, 
from which a native brandy is made, form a special feature. Live stock 
is more important than crops. The hills are grazed by. sheep and goats, 
and pigs are fattened on the acorns and beechnuts of the forest. The 
common draft animals are cattle. There is considerable mineral wealth 
as yet slightly developed. The coast of the Adriatic is practically in- 
accessible except at the port of Fiume, which is claimed by Italy, but may 
be made a free city and port like Danzig. Jugoslavia has trade outlets 
also by way of the Danube and the Vardar valley. The capital is the 
Serbian city of Belgrade on the Danube. 

Bulgaria. — Bulgaria comprises the main Balkan ranges and intervening 
basins and borders the Black Sea. Admixture with Mongolian invaders 
has made the Bulgarians more Asiatic than the other South Slavs, with 
whom they are not friendly. The main resources of the country are ob- 
tained from farms and forests. Roses grown for the manufacture of per- 
fume are a special product of the southern slopes. Bulgaria is crossed by 
the Oriental Railway from Paris and Vienna to Constantinople and Bagdad 
and has ports on the Black Sea. The Bulgarians dispute with Roumania 
possession of the Dobrudja, a sterile plateau between the Danube and the 
Black Sea, and lay claim to a part of Thrace on the iEgean coast. Bulgaria 
is the size of Ohio and has a population of about 4,300,000. Sofia (103,000) 
is the capital. There are no other large cities. 

Albania. — About 1,000,000 people of an ancient race, very distinct from 
their neighbors, inhabit the rugged mountains at the southeastern end of 
the Adriatic Sea. These Albanians are shepherds and small farmers, 
divided into many tribes and clans, having little intercourse with one 
another and no political unity. They are fierce fighters and have never 



466 



REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 



been subjugated even by the Turks. They resist foreign control, but their 
territory, a little larger than Massachusetts, is claimed by the Jugoslavs, 
Greeks, and Italians. The Italians have possession of the region around 
Valona, a good seaport which commands the entrance to the Adriatic. 
An independent Albania may come into existence. 

Macedonia and Thrace. — The JLgean coastland of the Balkan Penin- 
sula has a strikingly ragged border of fingerlike projections, gulfs, and 
islands. The people consist of a confused mixture of Slavs, Turks, Greeks, 
and Jews, numbering about 2,000,000. The principal value of the region 
lies in its ports, of which Salonica, the natural outlet of the whole Balkan 
Peninsula, is a point of great commercial and military importance. This 
port, with Macedonia, including most of the coast region, is now a part of 
Greece. In the east Thrace has been removed from the control of Bulgaria 
and Turkey and assigned to Greece. 

Constantinople (1,000,000). — No city in Europe has a more eventful 
history or a more, commanding site than Constantinople on the Bosporus. 
It is the toll gate through which the commerce of the Black Sea, including 
that of Russia and the Danubian countries, must pass, and it is a bridge 
between Europe and Asia. The rival and successor of Rome in world su- 
premacy, it became the religious center of the Mohammedan world and has 
been held by the Turks since 1453, but for a long time past only because 
the Christian powers were unwilling to trust it to any one of their own 
number. It remains the seat of the Turkish government and the residence 
of the Sultan, but the city and strait are virtually under international 
control. 




20 40 00 80 



Fig- 35i- — Constantinople and vicinity. 



CHAPTER XXXI 

THE MEDITERRANEAN PROVINCE 

The Mediterranean Sea and its coast lands are the theater 
in which has developed the oldest, highest, and most enduring 
civilization the world has ever seen. Such a civilization could 
arise and persist only under favorable geographic conditions. 
The sea itself is a great cleft in the. continental platform due 
largely to the subsidence of detached blocks of the earth -crust, 
leaving ridges upstanding between. It is almost cut in two by 
the ridge of the Apennine-Atlas mountains. It consists of three 
basins, each of which is more than two miles deep (Fig. 336). 
The eastern and largest basin opens westward through the shal- 
low strait between Sicily and Tunis. The middle and smallest 
basin is nearly inclosed by Italy, Sicily, Sardinia, and Cor- 
sica. The western basin is connected with the Atlantic by the 
Strait of Gibraltar, only 15 miles wide. The Mediterranean 
is more than 2000 miles long, and its area is about 1,000,000 
square miles. The shallow arm of the Adriatic extends north- 
ward 500 miles, while in the northeast the /Egean, Dardanelles, 
Marmora, and Bosporus connect with the basin of the Black 
Sea, which extends 700 miles eastward and has an area of 
180,000 square miles. The Mediterranean washes the shores 
of three continents which it at once separates and connects, 
after the balanced fashion of minor oceanic waters (p. 157). 

The northern coast lands of the Mediterranean are high and 
traversed by the curved and branching ranges of the Spanish 
Sierras, Pyrenees, Alps, Apennines, Pindus, Rhodope, Taurus, 
and other lesser mountains. The Rhone valley and the Dar- 
danelles-Bosporus depression are the only considerable gaps in 
the barrier. The African coast land is mountainous from 

467 



468 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

Gibraltar to Tunis* but the eastern basin is bounded by the 
desert lowlands of the Sahara to the delta of the Nile. The 
eastern parts of the Mediterranean and the adjacent countries 
are often called the Levant. 

The climate of the Mediterranean province, already de- 
scribed (p. 218), owes much of its genial character to the vast 
body of water, the surface layer of which, 1200 feet thick, has 
a temperature of about 70 , and acts in winter as an efficient 
hot-water heating plant. The Sahara on the south and the 
mountains on the north include between them a physiographic, 
climatic, economic, and human unit, in which European, African, 
and Asiatic characters are well blended. 

The Alps. — The Alps sweep in a great hook-shaped curve 
from the Gulf of Genoa, west, north, and east to the Danube at 
Vienna. The outer margin measures 820 miles, and the inner 
470 miles. The width varies from 80 to 150 miles, and the area 
is about 90,000 square miles, equal to that of Great Britain. 
The Alps are not a wall but a broad slab with steep edges about 
two miles thick, an incised plateau lifted into the higher layer 
of the atmosphere. The central core of the system is of crys- 
talline rocks, with limestones and sandstones on the flanks, all 
folded, crumpled, contorted, and thrust over and under one 
another in the most complex manner. The highest peaks are in 
the central French-Swiss-Italian portion, and are from 13,000 to 
over 15,000 feet high. The boss of St. Gothard is a center from 
which streams flow in all directions to the Rhone, Rhine, and 
Po. The waste of the Alps has contributed to build up the 
plains of France, Holland, Germany, Hungary, Roumania, and 
Italy. In the western and central Alps the passes are 6000 to 
7000 feet above the sea. In the eastern Alps the peaks and 
passes are somewhat lower than in the central. The climatic, 
economic, and human conditions change abruptly at the south- 
ern margin of the Alps from Atlantic, temperate, and German 
to Mediterranean, subtropical, and Italian. 

The Alps are a region of scenic beauty perhaps unrivaled in 



MEDITERRANEAN PROVINCE 



469 



the world. Sharp, frost-riven peaks, horns, and needles rising 
above snow- and ice-lilled cirques, glacier-worn valleys, water- 
falls, and deep, narrow, or winding lakes form a combination of 
elements which seem to belong to another world (Figs. 61, 102, 
103, 105). The Alps are crossed by many carriage roads (Fig. 
295) and footpaths, and by six trunk-line railroads. One French 
line passes through the Mont Cenis tunnel, 7.6 miles long, at 
an altitude of 4380 feet, and another by way of the broad 
upper Rhone valley to the Simplon tunnel, 12.3 miles long, and 




Fig. 352. — Railroads and passes in the Alps. 

only 2300 feet above the sea. One German line passes up the 
valley of the Reuss and through the St. Gothard tunnel (Fig. 
296), 9.3 miles long, at a height of 3785 feet, and another by the 
valley of the Inn crosses the Brenner pass at a height of 4470 
feet. An Austrian line from Salzburg crosses the Hohe Tauern 
through a tunnel 5.3 miles long at a height of 4000 feet. A 
9-mile tunnel to connect Bern with the Simplon line has been 
opened at Lotschberg. In each case, the descent on the Italian 
side is accomplished by way of steep and difficult valleys. The 
line from Vienna to Venice by the Semmering pass, 2970 feet 
above the sea, has easier grades. 

The rainfall in the Alps varies from 20 to 90 inches, and the 
temperature from subtropical to polar. The northern valleys 



47° 



REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 



are favored by winds which descend the slope and are warmed 
by compression. 

Alpine Economics. — Alpine climates, products, and life vary 
chiefly in a vertical direction. The small areas of arable land 
in the valleys below 2500 feet produce rye, oats, potatoes, and 
hay, and on the southern slope the vine and the mulberry. 
Cattle and goats are pastured on the middle slopes and furnish 
butter, cheese, and condensed milk. Above the pastures are 

forests, and uninhabitable 
waste land amounting to 
more than half the whole 
area. Dairying is the chief 
occupation. Cattle and goats 
are wintered in the valleys, 
and in spring are driven by 
the men and boys up to the 
high Alps (pastures), follow- 
ing the retreating snow. The 
women remain in the valleys 
to cultivate the crops, while 
the men and boys make but- 
ter and cheese on the moun- 

Fig. 353. -Porterage in Switzerland. tains _ Most of ^ high 

pastures and chalets can be reached only by footpaths, and this 
entails a heavy burden of porterage in getting dairy products 
to market and provisions to the herdsmen. Every peasant man, 
woman, and child is a beast of burden, carrying a conical basket 
of appropriate size fastened to the shoulders. Hay and firewood 
are often gathered from difficult and dangerous places and car- 
ried home in bundles. 

Switzerland includes not only the central Alps, but the low 
limestone folds of the Jura (Fig. 39) in the west and the hilly 
plateau between. The plateau is much superior to the moun- 
tains in soil, climate, and products, yet the country imports 
cereals, meat, wine, and timber, as well as minerals, and pays 




MEDITERRANEAN PROVINCE — ITALY 



471 



for them largely with cotton, silk, and straw goods, machinery, 
and small articles, such as watches, clocks, and jewelry. Wood 
carving, straw plaiting, lace making, and other hand industries 
are carried on by the peasants in their homes during the win- 
ter. Water power is used, especially in electrochemical works. 
Many of the people are engaged in caring for the millions of 
tourists and foreign visitors, who are a source of large income. 
There is no great wealth and little poverty among the people. 
The railways include many cogwheel and cable roads, designed 
for sight-seers; some of them reach a height of 10,000 feet. 
Nearly all the lines, as well as many miles of post roads, are 
owned and managed by the state. 

The Swiss Confederation is composed of twenty-two cantons, 
and the government is the most democratic in the world. The 
public school system, including seven universities, is not inferior 
to that of Germany. Zurich, Basel, and Geneva are the only 
towns having more than 100,000 people. The population is 
3,750,000, of which about 70 per cent speak German, 20 per 
cent French, and 8 per cent Italian. This small state, filling a 
chink between four great powers, has been able to win and main- 
tain its independence because mountain lands are not very 
attractive to invaders and are easily defended, while mountain 
life fosters a hardy and liberty-loving people. 

Italy 

" Beyond the Alps lies Italy " is a concrete expression of the 
joys which follow after passing through hardships and perils. 
A European peninsula 600 miles long, which lacks but 100 miles 
of joining Africa, Italy holds a commanding position in the 
Mediterranean. It is nearly twice as large as Florida, but 
smaller than the British Isles. The southeastern slope of the 
Alps and the plain of the Po constitute a continental portion, 
from which the Apennine chain, 7000 to 9000 feet in height and, 
with its forelands, about 100 miles wide, extends southeast- 
ward in the form of a top boot. The narrow Strait of Messina 



472 



REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 



separates the toe of the boot from the large triangular island of 
Sicily. The northern Apennines are comparatively smooth and 
traversable by open valleys. The central part, of fissured lime- 
stone, and the southern, containing knots of old igneous rock, 
are shattered by intersecting fault lines, along which displace- 
ment is still going on. It is one of the most active earthquake 
regions in the world (Fig. 56). The western side of the penin- 
sula, including Sicily, is highly volcanic. Vesuvius (4000 feet), 




Fig. 354. — Bay of Naples and Mt. Vesuvius. 



Etna (11,000 feet), and the Lipari islands between the two, are 
frequently in eruption. The Adriatic coast is smooth, but the 
western coast is a succession of promontories and cuvettes 
(p. 169). The 4000 miles of coast line make Italy resemble a 
gigantic pier thrust out into the currents of human civilization. 
The islands of Sardinia, Corsica, and Elba are physically frag- 
ments of the Italian land. 

Climate and Vegetation. — Mountain walls on the north and 
Mediterranean water on both sides give to " sunny Italy " a 
genial climate with little or no frost or snow, becoming almost 
tropical in the south. The sirocco, a hot, moist, and oppressive 



MEDITERRANEAN PROVINCE — ITALY 473 

wind from the south, and the tramontana, el cool, bracing wind 
from the north, are occasional features. The rainfall varies 
from about 45 inches in the north to 27 inches in the south. 
The summers are so dry that many streams disappear. Irriga- 
tion is practiced more extensively than in any other European 
country. The conspicuous natural vegetation consists of small, 
leathery-leaved evergreen trees and shrubs growing in clumps 
(p. 233). The chestnut flourishes and is an important source 
of food. Cactuses, introduced from America, especially the 
prickly pear, are common in the south. Grass is generally 
poor, hence goats are more numerous than cattle. 

Agriculture. — All crops are grown in Italy. The Po plain 
is covered with the waste of the Alps, and is growing out into 
the shallow head of the Adriatic. The river is subject to great 
floods, which are completely controlled by levees. The river 
banks and road grades are many feet above the level of the fields, 
and the water is used for irrigation. Wheat, corn, rice, and 
hay which is cut many times a year on the same land, are the 
main crops. Cattle and horses are numerous, and poultry, 
eggs, and cheese are exported. South of the Apennines olive 
orchards and vineyards, the vines being trained over mulberry 
trees, occupy about 12,000 square miles. The south, especially 
Sicily, is one of the great tropical fruit- and nut-growing districts 
of the world, yielding oranges, lemons, figs, citrons, walnuts, 
almonds, and pistachios. Corn is the staple food of the com- 
mon people. Excellent hard wheat is grown in the southeast 
and used for making macaroni. One third of the whole country 
is mountainous, and about three eighths under cultivation. 

Minerals and Manufactures. — Italy is a young land, poor 
in minerals. Marble from the northern Apennines and sul- 
phur from Sicily are the most important. Lead, zinc, and iron 
are mined in Sardinia and Elba. Coal is imported from Eng- 
land. The abundance of cheap labor and water power has 
made possible a remarkable development of manufactures. The 
making of silk thread from domestic and foreign cocoons is a 



474 



REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 



leading industry. Cotton, woolen, and leather goods are made 
beyond the home demand. Elba iron ores are smelted. Water 
power is used in steel and chemical works. Italy, like France, 
excels in artistic hand-made products, among which glass, lace, 
coral and shell work, woodwork, marble sculptures, and paint- 
ings are famous. 




Fig- 355-— The Grand Canal, Venice. 

Communications and Commerce. — On account of the diffi- 
culty of the passes, central and southern Italy are crossed by 
but two railroads. The principal lines follow the coast. The 
network is closest in the Po plain. The total mileage is about 
10,000, of which four fifths is state-owned. Italy is naturally 
adapted for maritime commerce, but is retarded by a narrow 
and mountainous hinterland. The Alpine railways (Fig. 352) 
bring to Genoa a large trade from southern Germany, and it is 
now the second port on the Mediterranean. Venice, built upon 



MEDITERRANEAN PROVINCE — ITALY 



475 



the islands of a barrier beach and having canals for streets, has 
lost much of the commerce which once made it the wealthiest 
and most luxurious city in Europe, but by the Brenner pass it 
shares in the transalpine trade. Naples has a magnificent bay 
and is the terminus of many American steamship lines. Brin- 
disi, reached by rail from the north, is a port of embarkation 
for the Levant and Orient. The principal Italian exports are 
raw and woven silk, cotton goods, fruits, wine, cheese, olive oil, 
and sulphur. The imports are coal, wheat, raw cotton, raw silk 
and cocoons, iron, steel, machinery, and fish. 




iJM'iHiif'';' 




Fig. 356. —The Colosseum, Rome. 

Cities. — There are thirteen urban communes having a popu- 
lation of over 100,000. Naples (698,000) is made attractive by 
the most beautiful bay in the world and the proximity of the 
most famous volcano. Milan (663,000) and Turin (452,000) lie 
at the convergence of many transalpine routes and are the trade 
centers of the prosperous and progressive Po plain. Rome 
(591,000), the former mistress of the world, the seat of the 
Holy See and residence of the Pope, and the capital of the 
kingdom of Italy, is a strange combination of the ancient and 
modern, where the Colosseum, or circus of the Roman emperors, 



47 6 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

and St. Peter's church, each the largest building of its kind in 
the world, confront each other. No other city possesses equal 
historic and artistic interest. The old city, encumbered with 
colossal ruins, has been transformed into a clean, elegant, and 
well-equipped modern city suited to the life of the present day. 
Palermo (346,000) is the chief port for the Sicilian fruit trade. 
Florence (242,000) and Venice (168,000) are rich above all the 
rest in treasures of architecture and art. The importance of 
Italian towns cannot be measured by their population alone. 
Italy lives largely upon its past, and many towns, though small, 
are not obscure. Their names are written into the world's 
history, literature, and art. Climate, scenery, and many of the 
greatest works of human achievement combine to render Italy 
the most attractive country in Europe to the traveler. 

People. — Italy has been in the way of streams of human 
migration, and the arena of repeated foreign conquest for thou- 
sands of years. The mass of the people are the descendants of 
slaves brought from every part of the known world during the 
long sway of the Roman Empire. Consequently the Italians 
have strains of blood derived from every branch of the white 
race. The mixture has been well blended and unified, speaking 
one language, and since 1871 under one government. Northern 
Italy is industrial, progressive, democratic, and prosperous. 
Southern Italy is agricultural, reactionary, feudal, poor, and 
ignorant. This difference is due as much to the natural wealth 
of one region and the poverty of the other, as to racial and his- 
torical influences. The south Italian at home lives upon polenta, 
or corn-meal mush without salt, and black bread baked twice 
a year, and seldom tastes meat. The emigration is very large, 
amounting in some years to over 600,000 persons, of whom two 
thirds go to the United States, Brazil, and Argentina. Many 
return after a time, bringing home money and new ideas, but 
the total number of Italians living abroad probably amounts 
to five or six millions. The population of Italy is 37,000,000, 
strongly condensed near the coast. 



MEDITERRANEAN PROVINCE — SPAIN AND PORTUGAL 477 

As a result of the World War Italy has redeemed several dis- 
tricts inhabited chiefly by Italians. Austria has ceded to Italy 
the Trentino, a triangular area on the southern slope of the Alps, 
and the peninsula of Istria, which includes the great port of 
Trieste (230,000) at the head of the Adriatic (Fig. 352). This 
places the Austro-Italian frontier at the crest of the Alps. Italy 
also lays claim, as necessary for her adequate protection, to 
Dalmatia, a long, narrow strip of the east Adriatic coast inhab- 
ited by Slavs and including the port of Fiume and a few other 
small Italian cities, thus cutting off Jugoslavia from the sea. 

Spain and Portugal 

The Iberian Peninsula is a compact land mass twice as large 
as Italy. Seven eighths of its boundary is seacoast, and the 
remainder is formed by the abrupt and unbroken wall of the 
Pyrenees, 10,000 feet high. Three fourths of the peninsula is 
an old block plateau about 2500 feet in elevation, with steep es- 
carpments on the south and northeast (Fig. 57). It is traversed 
diagonally by block mountains 7000 to 8000 feet in height. The 
eastern edge is also mountainous. The margins of the block are 
rich in minerals. The Sierra Nevada on the south and the 
Cantabrian-Pyrenees on the north are young mountains folded 
up against the old block. The large lowland areas are in the 
valleys of the Guadalquivir, Guadiana, and Tagus in the south- 
west. The coast line is generally high and little indented. 
Although peninsular, this region has all the characteristics of a 
continental land on a small scale. 

Climate and Vegetation. — On account of the form and relief 
of the peninsula, the climate, in its range of temperature, great 
and rapid changes, and general dryness, is more continental 
than that of any other Mediterranean country. The northwest 
corner enjoys a typical Atlantic climate with heavy perennial 
rainfall, while the southeast is hot and almost rainless. The 
northern and central mountains are covered with summer forests 
containing groves of chestnut and cork oak, the interior is a 



478 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

treeless steppe, while in the southern half Mediterranean ever- 
green shrubs appear. 

Agriculture. — ■ In the Mediterranean belt the irrigated valleys 
produce luxuriant tropical fruits, — oranges, dates, pomegran- 
ates, olives, and Malaga grapes. Rice, cotton, sugar cane, corn, 
and vegetables are also grown. The principal crop of the 
plateau is wheat. In summer the dry pastures support flocks 
of sheep, which are driven down to the valleys in winter. Out- 
side the irrigated areas, methods of agriculture are extremely 
inefficient, land lying untilled or being cultivated in a destructive 
manner. The population is generally poor and ignorant. 

Minerals and Manufactures. — Spain is the richest mineral 
region in Europe. Lead and silver are mined in the southeast, 
copper in the southwest, and excellent iron ore near the northern 
coast. Although large coal fields lie near, they are not much 
worked, and the ore is sent to Wales to be smelted. About 
two fifths of the world's supply of mercury comes from Almaden. 
A considerable industry in textiles, leather, and paper is carried 
on in the northeast, where the people are more progressive. 

Communications and Commerce. — The high margins of the 
plateau offer obstructions to navigation on the rivers, and to 
railway building. The upper river courses are in gorges and 
canons which render them useless and difficult to cross. A 
trunk line, connecting with the French system, passes the west end 
of the Pyrenees to Madrid and Lisbon, and another follows the 
east coast to Gibraltar. Foreign trade is very small, the exports 
consisting chiefly of wine, fruits, cork, and metallic minerals, and 
the imports of coal, cotton, foodstuffs, and machinery. 

Portugal. — The southwestern plains, separated from the 
plateau by gorges and canons in the rivers, belong largely to 
Portugal. They are maritime and Atlantic, and are the best 
part of the peninsula. Wine, the most important product, is 
shipped under the name of port from the city of Oporto. Lisbon 
(435,000), at the mouth of the Tagus, has one of the finest har- 
bors in the world. 



MEDITERRANEAN PROVINCE — GREECE 479 

Cities. — Madrid (649,000), the highest capital in Europe, 
arbitrarily located in the midst of a desolate plateau, with a 
severe climate both summer and winter, has the advantage 
of a central location commanding mountain passes, and has 
become the political, commercial, and railroad nucleus of the 
peninsula. Barcelona (621,000) is the second city and most 
vigorous commercial and industrial center. It carries on a 
large trade with France. Valencia (246,000), Malaga, Cadiz, 
and Seville are very old cities and have had an eventful history. 
They are now the outlets for tropical fruits from the irrigated 
gardens around them. 

People. — The Iberian peninsula has been invaded by peoples 
from the south, east, and north, and the struggles between them 
for possession continued through 1500 years. Consequently the 
population is derived from many different elements, — Medi- 
terranean, Celtic, Roman, Teutonic, Arab, and Moorish. The 
population of Spain and Portugal is now 27,000,000. In the 
sixteenth century the Spanish and Portuguese obtained posses- 
sion of South* America, North America nearly to the Missouri- 
Mississippi, and of large parts of Africa, and have left their 
languages and the impress of their character upon one sixth of 
the land area of the globe. Most of the colonies have become 
independent, and the mother countries have sunk into a state 
of apathy and insignificance. Since the loss of their foreign 
possessions, they have had an opportunity to develop their do- 
mestic resources. Spain is Mediterranean and African in most 
of its physical and human conditions, while Portugal looks 
toward the north Atlantic, and is well situated to take part in 
the life of which that ocean is the center. 

Greece 

Greece, about as large as Pennsylvania, is " the greatest country in the 
world of its size," but its greatness lies almost wholly in the past. Here 
the southern end of the Dinaric system frays out in many branches, which 
finally break up into an archipelago. The valleys are partly drowned, and 



480 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

the land has been characterized as " standing up to its knees in water." 
The southern part is nearly severed from the northern by the Gulf of Corinth, 
and the separation has been completed by a ship canal four miles long across 
the isthmus. The position, relief, and climate of Greece had much influence 
upon the extraordinary development of politics, philosophy, science, litera- 
ture, and art which characterized its early history, but they are not sufficient 
to keep its people above the average level of the Mediterranean standard. 
The climate is much like that of southern California. Irrigation is necessary, 
the principal products being olives, wine, and so-called currants, which are 
really small seedless grapes. Many sheep and goats are kept, and some iron 
ore is mined and exported. 

As a result of the World War, Greece has gained important acces- 
sions by the annexation of Thrace, former Turkish territory around the port 
of Smyrna (375,000) in Asia Minor, and of the ^Egean islands, where the 
people are largely of Greek blood and speech. The total area of Greece 
exceeds that of New York and the population is about 7,000,000. 






CHAPTER XXXII 

THE MANCHURIAN AND CHINESE PROVINCES 

The Manchurian and Chinese provinces closely resemble the 
Mississippian and Floridan provinces of North America. The 
Manchurian corresponds in position with the country between 
the Gulf of St. Lawrence and the Gulf of Mexico and extending 
westward to Lake Huron and the Mississippi. To this are 
added the islands of Japan, which would stretch from Nova 
Scotia to Florida, at a distance of 125 to 500 miles offshore. 
The Chinese province has a position and area corresponding 
to the Gulf of Mexico. The two are separated by an east-west 
mountain range as high as the southern Blue Ridge. The main- 
land portion of the two provinces includes the densely peopled 
parts of the Chinese Republic. 

China 

The mainland portion of the Manchurian province is largely 
occupied by two extensive plains, besides the mountainous penin- 
sula of Korea, corresponding in position with the Delaware- 
Chesapeake peninsula, but much larger. The loess deposits of 
the province are very extensive (p. 144). The alluvial plain of 
the Hoang, five times as large as that of the Mississippi, is ex- 
tremely fertile but subject to disastrous floods. The mouth of 
the river has shifted repeatedly a distance of 300 miles. The 
Chinese province is a mountainous plateau inclosing isolated 
valleys belonging to the Yangtze, Min, and Si rivers. The 
highlands bordering the Chinese plain contain very extensive 
beds of anthracite and bituminous coal, which have hardly been 
touched. The plateau contains coal, copper, silver, lead, and 
tin, all of which are mined to some extent. 



MANCHURIAN AND CHINESE PROVINCES — CHINA 483 

Climate and Crops. — The range of temperature is somewhat 
greater than on the Atlantic coast of North America. The 
southeast monsoons bring an excessive rainfall in summer, which 
causes floods in the rivers. Manchuria is a region of open 
forest, prairie, and steppe, resembling Manitoba and adapted 
to wheat growing and grazing. The Chinese plateau and moun- 
tains were originally covered with temperate rain and summer 
forests, but have been almost entirely denuded. Bamboo is 
used for most purposes in place of timber. In the Chinese 
plain and plateau valleys, agriculture of a very intensive char- 
acter prevails, the slopes being terraced and cultivated in some 
places to a height of 7000 feet. Irrigation is generally practiced, 
both from streams and from wells, and the warmth and rainfall 
of summer enable two crops a year to be harvested. Rice is an 
almost universal crop, and the main food of the people. It is 
supplemented by beans and fish. The loess soils are so porous 
that in a dry season the crops fail and serious famines occur. 
The silk industry is very important, both from domesticated 
" worms " and those which exist in a natural wild state. China 
produces about 30 per cent of the world's supply of raw silk. 
China has long been famous for its tea plantations, for which 
the warm, moist summer, winter without severe frost, and red, 
friable, well-drained soil of the Chinese province are very favor- 
able. Cotton and opium are also grown, but in quantities 
insufficient for domestic consumption. Manufactures include 
cotton and silk fabrics, straw matting, and porcelain " china- 
ware." 

Transportation. — Roads in China are very poor, especially 
in the plateau provinces, and transportation is mostly by 
porterage, wheelbarrows, pack animals, and bullock carts. 
Wheelbarrows are used because it is easier to find a passable 
track for one wheel than for two. They are propelled by hand, 
sometimes with a donkey or a sail to assist. The great rivers 
are the arteries of commerce and are supplemented by canals. 
Of these the Yangtze is the most important, being navigable 



484 



REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 




HONGKONG 



by ocean steamers for 680 miles, for river steamers 1000 miles, 
and for small craft 500 miles farther. Millions of people make 
their home in boats, which are towed, when the wind fails, by 
men " tracking " along the shore. Railroads are much needed, 
but as yet only about 5000 miles are open. It often happens 
that the people of one province starve while there is abundance 
in another, because food cannot be got to them. 

Foreign Commerce and Seaports. — The foreign commerce of 
Chinaamounts to about $1,000,000,000 annually, the chief exports 

being silk, beans, and tea, and 
the imports cotton goods, opi- 
um, sugar, rice, petroleum, and 
metals. Of the ports open to 
foreign trade, Shanghai is by 
far the most important, han- 
dling about one third of the 
whole. The second is Canton, 
with about one tenth. The 
British colony of Hongkong 
includes an island and adjacent mainland at the mouth of the 
Si River. The city of Victoria on the island has one of the 
finest harbors in the world, and handles nearly as much trade 
as Liverpool. 

People of China. — No accurate census of China has ever 
been taken, and estimates of population vary from 270,000,000 
to 439,000,000. The country is populated to the maximum 
density which it can support. There are eleven cities with a 
probable population above 200,000 and seven above 500,000, 
of which Canton exceeds 1,000,000. The Chinese are indus- 
trious, skillful, thrifty, and honest, but overcrowding keeps the 
masses in poverty. The standard of living is low and generally 
upon the very edge of the means of subsistence. The Chinese 
emigrate in large numbers to India, Indo-China, the Malay 
Archipelago, and the islands of the Pacific, and constitute the 
" yellow peril" from which the United States and Australia 



Fig. 358. — Delta of the Si River. 



MANCHURIAN AND CHINESE PROVINCES — JAPAN 485 

protect themselves by exclusion laws. The mineral resources 
of the country and the abundance of cheap labor favor an 
enormous industrial development whenever railroads and foreign 
capital and machinery can gain access. China may yet be the 
greatest manufacturing country of the world. Under a deadening 




Fig. 359. — Street scene, Peking, China. 



religion and a corrupt government, China has made little progress 
for thousands of years. Some measure of escape from these 
seems to be at hand, and the natural conditions are favorable 
for development to the rank of a great world power. 

Japan 

The island empire of Japan has no natural analogue in the 
world except possibly New Zealand. It has been compared 
to the British Isles, but the contrasts are on the whole greater 
than the resemblances. It consists of a chain of four large islands, 
with hundreds of smaller ones, extending from Kamchatka 



486 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

to Formosa, and now includes also the southern half of Sak- 
halin and the peninsula of Korea. The islands are the summits 
of an old mountain range, rising from the profoundest depths 
of the Pacific and crowned with many volcanic cones 8000 
to 12,000 feet above the sea. They are the most active earth- 
quake area in the world (p. 69), and waves in the earth crust 
and sea, volcanic eruptions, and typhoons (p. 208) would seem 
to make the country difficult of habitation. Three fourths of 
the land is mountainous and heavily forested, and less than 16 
per cent is under cultivation. Bays and harbors are numerous, 
and the southern islands border a long strait called the Inland 
Sea. Coal is plentiful and copper is mined for export. 

Climate and Vegetation. — The islands are exposed to the 
southeast monsoons in summer and to northwest winds from 
the continent in winter. The consequent large range of tem- 
perature is somewhat modified by branches of the warm Japan 
current flowing on both sides. The rainfall varies below and 
above 60 inches. April to September is a wet season, Novem- 
ber to January dry. The northern island, Yezo, is snow-covered 
in winter and foggy in summer. The southern islands have 
little frost at sea level, and the bamboo and sago palm flourish. 
Familiar American and European trees, such as the pine, elm, 
chestnut, oak, and maple, grow in great luxuriance, but are 
mingled with peculiar species of cedar, laurel, paper mulberry, 
and many others. Oranges, figs, and large persimmons are 
characteristic fruits. The cherry and plum are grown chiefly 
for their blossoms. Rice, barley, millet, and beans are the 
staple food crops. The farms are so small that garden culture 
prevails, and domestic animals are few. In the production of 
sLk Japan now surpasses China, and Japan and Formosa 
teas are of superior quality. About 3,000,000 people live by 
fishing, and whale meat is more common in market than beef 
or mutton. Houses are built of bamboo, paper, and other light 
materials, and are thus comparatively safe from destruction by 
earthquakes (Fig. 55). 



MANCHURIAN AND CHINESE PROVINCES — JAPAN 487 



Manufactures and Transportation. — Generations of hand 
labor, combined with native talent, have made the Japanese 
superior in many lines of handicraft, and rivals of the French 
in beauty of artistic work. Their art products include wares 
in paper, matting, silk, porcelain, lacquer, enamel, gold, silver, 
bronze, and steel. Ironworks and shipyards are maintained 
by the government. Cotton, silk, and woolen mills using coal 
and water power have been established at Osaka. Transporta- 
tion is largely by porterage and pack horses. In cities two- 
wheeled handcarts, called jinrikishas, take the place of cabs and 
cars. The railroad mileage is about 5000. 




Fig. 360. — Street scene, Yokohama, Japan. 

Commerce. — Yokohama (429,000) is the chief port for 
American trade. Nagasaki (137,000), on the south island, and 
Kobe (498,000), on the Inland Sea, handle the Asiatic trade. 



^88 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

The Japanese take as naturally to the sea as the British, and 
have had long experience as fishermen. They have the ambition 
and the natural facilities to carry on most of the shipping trade 
of the north Pacific. Tokyo, the capital, has a population 
above 2,200,000, Osaka above 1,400,000, and Kyoto 540,000. 

People. — The Japanese are the ablest of Mongolian peoples. 
Within the last fifty years they have abandoned a long-continued 
policy of seclusion and a feudal government, and have adopted 
European education, science, arts, industries, customs, and 
government. That a whole people should be willing to throw 
away their native, ancestral civilization and adopt almost bodily 
that of foreigners is a marvel surpassed only by their success in 
doing so in little more than one generation. In fighting strength 
of army and navy, Japan has taken a high rank among the 
great world powers. In the Japanese Islands the population of 
56,000,000 in an area no larger than that of South Carolina, 
Georgia, and Florida is overcrowded, and expansion to the 
sparsely populated lands of Korea and Manchuria, and a change 
from agriculture to industrial occupations, are as desirable as 
they are inevitable. That little Japan rather than big China 
should be the dominant power in eastern Asia is favored by the 
oceanic accessibility of the one and the continental isolation of 
the other. 



CHAPTER XXXIII 

THE MEXICAN AND CARIBBEAN PROVINCES 

Mexico 

The Mexican Province is a subtropical plateau 5000 to 7000 
feet in elevation, with marginal mountain ranges. It includes 
the greater part of. the area and people of the republic of Mexico. 
Its elevation gives it a temperate climate with a hot season. 
The winters are dry and the summer rainfall is nowhere much 
above or below 20 inches. A large part of it is semiarid and 
requires irrigation. The natural vegetation is tropical forest of 
the thorn scrub variety (p. 234). It is sometimes called " the 
land of the cactus " on account of the number and variety of 
plants of that family found there. This plateau is probably 
the original home of the corn (maize) plant, which has always 
been the most important agricultural product, and with beans 
supplies the food of the common people. Wheat and cotton 
are grown, but not sufficient to supply the home consumption. 
Several species of agave, of which the century plant is one, yield 
valuable fibers, and another species is the source of pulque, the 
national intoxicating drink. Chili, or red pepper, is universally 
used as a condiment. 

Indians. — At the t'me of European discovery, the plateau of Mexico 
was occupied by the Aztecs and related tribes, who had attained a higher 
degree of civilization than any other Indians of North America. Corn, 
cotton, and agave formed their economic basis. Without iron or domestic 
animals except the dog, irrigation and hoe culture were highly successful. 
Their manufactures of dyed cotton cloth and ornamental articles of feathers, 
silver, and copper were highly artistic. Their buildings of stone, their 
lofty artificial mounds for religious purposes, and their mines and irrigating 
works showed considerable engineering skill. The Spaniards ruled and 



49° , REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

plundered Mexico for three hundred years, but never really colonized it 
They introduced cattle, sheep, horses, and donkeys. Cattle and sheep 
raising are now important industries, while the donkey and mule have 
become the common beasts of burden. 

Mining. — Mexico has always- been " the land of silver " and 
now produces more than any other country. The native mines 
were developed by the Spaniards, who derived from them fabu- 
lous wealth. Some of them are still worked by primitive 
methods, the ore being hoisted in sacks on the backs of men, 
who climb notched logs or ladders. The ore is broken by a 
heavy stone disk rolled around by animal power, and finally 
reduced to powder by dragging stone blocks over it. The 
crushed ore is mixed with water and chemicals in a stone tank 
and trodden by animals and men until the silver is extracted. 
In recent times modern mining machinery and methods have 
been introduced. Mexico is also an important source of 
copper. 

The Mexican petroleum fields near Tampico produced in 
1918 about 55,000,000 barrels, giving that country a rank 
next to the United States and Russia. The oil resources of 
Mexico are estimated to fall little short of those of the United 
States and may prove of greater value than metals. 

Manufactures. — The -scarcity of fuel has restricted manu- 
facture by power machinery, and domestic hand work prevails. 
Water power is being used to run cotton mills, and at Monterey 
blast furnaces burning coke from native coal are in operation. 
The natives are skillful artisans and produce blankets, cloaks, 
laces, leather goods, jewelry, and carved woodwork among the 
best of their kind. 

Transportation and Commerce. — Primitive methods of trans- 
portation still largely prevail. Much of the hoisting and carry- 
ing is done by porterage. The typical native is of moderate 
stature and light build, yet habitually walks rapidly, carrying 
burdens over rough trails which few white men could undertake. 
In the mines loads of 200 to 350 pounds are carried up ladders 



MEXICAN AND CARIBBEAN PROVINCES — MEXICO 



491 



of 1800 rounds, ten trips being made in six hours. A backload 

of 150 pounds is often carried 20 miles to market. In the cities, 

most of the work done in the 

United States by horse and 

electric trucks and drays is 

done upon men's backs. Most 

of the roads are only foot 

trails, and on great highways 

the porters, burros, pack 

mules, and clumsy oxcarts are 

more numerous than modern 

vehicles. 

Since 1880 some 15,000 
miles of railroad have been 
built, largely by foreign capi- 
tal. More than half is under 
government control. Two 
main lines traverse the pla- 
teau from north to south, 
connecting with the United 
States system at several 
points. Transverse lines are 
difficult and costly, and only two extend from sea to sea. The 
network is most dense in the south. 

Seaports. — Vera Cruz and Tampico on the Gulf coast are the 
principal gateways to the sea. Acapulco and Manzanillo on the 
Pacific have good harbors, but are difficult of access from the land. 

City of Mexico. — The metropolis of Spanish North America 
and the capital of Mexico is situated in a valley surrounded by 
volcanic mountains, near the southern edge of the plateau, at an 
elevation of 7400 feet. It was originally built in a shallow lake 
and reached by causeways. The valley is now drained by a 
canal 30 miles long, including a tunnel of 6 miles. The climate 
is agreeable and the scenery magnificent. The city contains 
many fine public buildings and has a population of 470,000. 




Fig. 361. — Market, city of Mexico. 



492 



REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 



Southern Mexico. — The southeastern part of the republic of Mexico 
belongs to the Caribbean province. High temperatures, heavy rainfall, 
and tropical forests prevail. It has been an important source of ma- 
hogany, rosewood, and other cabinet woods, but the supply is now 
greatly diminished. Sugar, coffee, cocoa, and bananas are the staple food 
products. Rubber is obtained from both wild and cultivated plants. The 
peninsula of Yucatan is a low limestone plain, with subterranean drainage. 
A species of agave which yields sisal, an excellent fiber for cordage and 
2;ing, is here indigenous and extensively cultivated. The Mexican 




Fig. 362. — Agave plantation, Mexico. 

government has recently completed a railway across the Isthmus of Te- 
huantepec, 192 miles long, with adequate harbor facilities. The summit 
level is only 700 feet above tide. This route between northern Pacific 
and Atlantic ports is much shorter than the Panama route, and will hold 
a large share of the traffic. 

People. — The population of Mexico is about 15,000,000, 
and is most dense in the states near the capital. About one 
fifth are of European, chiefly Spanish, descent, two fifths are 
pure Indian, and two fifths are of mixed blood. Many tribes, 
some numbering 500,000, maintain their original habits and 
language with little change. In Mexico the Indian has not 



MEXICAN AND CARIBBEAN PROVINCES 



493 



been exterminated or dispossessed, as in English-speaking 
America. There he still forms the great mass of the common 
people, is not a slave or an outcast, and occasionally contributes 
an able president to the republic. He has developed his own 
peculiar abilities and resources under favorable conditions, and 
has shown himself superior to most of the black, and equal to 
some of the yellow and white peoples. 

Caribbean Lands 

The Caribbean Province. — The lands which surround the 
Caribbean Sea are fragmentary or marginal, mountainous, and 
largely volcanic. They consist of four parts: (i) Central Amer- 
ica (with part of Mexico), a zigzag band of alternating isthmuses 
and peninsulas 1200 miles long, which connects the Mexican 
plateau with the Andean; (2) the Greater Antilles, a range of large 
islands extending eastward an equal distance; (3) the Lesser An- 
tilles, a chain of small volcanic islands connecting (2) and (4); 
(4) the South American coast ranges, between the Caribbean and 
Orinoco basins. These lands present a variety of structure, ele- 
vation, and exposure, but agree in having a high temperature, 
heavy summer rainfall, and a tropical vegetation. The climate 
is tempered near the coast by trade winds and monsoons from 
the sea, and in the interior by altitude. 

The banana, manioc, yam, and sweet potato are perennial 
and very prolific, and form the basis of the native -food supply. 
Coconuts, oranges, pineapples, and many other fruits grow 
wild. The forests contain cabinet woods, dyestuffs, medicinal 
plants, and rubber trees of great value. Cattle raising is an 
important industry on the highlands, where the forest gives way 
to grass. Four great staples are grown for export, — sugar cane, 
bananas, coffee, and tobacco. The province produces about 
one fourth of the world's crop of cane sugar, chiefly from the 
Cuban plantations. It is the source of all the bananas in the 
markets of North America. The climate of the uplands between 
1000 and 1200 feet in elevation is perfectly adapted to coffee 



494 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

growing, and the 12 per cent of the world's crop produced might 
be largely increased. Tobacco flourishes everywhere as a win- 
ter crop. 

Central America. — The Caribbean coast lands of Central 
America are low, marshy, and unheal thful. The highlands lie 
near the Pacific, and, in spite of volcanic eruptions and earth- 
quakes, are densely populated, especially in the northern part. 
On the plateaus and mountain slopes, oak and pine forests and 
grassy savannas sustain the principal occupation of cattle raising. 
Coffee of extra fine quality is grown and marketed in Europe. 
One third of the 5,000,000 people are pure Indian, and nearly 
all the rest of negro and mixed blood. 

The Panama Canal. — The Isthmus of Panama possesses no 
importance as a bridge between two continents, but as a barrier 
between two oceans it is a strategic point in world commerce 
and politics second to none. In 1855 the Panama Railroad was 
completed, and until the opening of transcontinental lines in the 
United States was an important route of traffic between the 
Atlantic and Pacific states. After unsuccessful attempts in 
Nicaragua and by the French at Panama, the United States 
government undertook to construct along the line of the railroad 
a ship canal which was opened in 1914. The work included 
not only the cutting of a canal 45 feet deep and 50 miles long, 
across a divide 250 feet high, but the construction of the largest 
dam in the world to control the floods of the Chagres River, of 
locks to reach the summit level, 85 feet above tide, and of a 
harbor at each end (p. 159, Fig. 149). The mechanical prob- 
lems which were solved were hardly greater than the sanitary 
one of maintaining an adequate force of laborers in one of the 
most unhealthful regions of the tropics. Their successful solu- 
tion constitutes the greatest achievement yet accomplished by 
man in overcoming natural barriers to progress. The naval 
forces of the United States on two oceans, instead of being 
divided by a six weeks' voyage, are now able to unite quickly 
on either coast. The cheapening of transcontinental freight 



CARIBBEAN PROVINCE 495 

rates has stimulated industry on both sides of the continent. 
The Gulf ports and the West Indies have acquired new impor- 
tance. The Pacific coast of South America has been brought 
into close relationship with the Atlantic ports of North America 
and Europe, some of the trade of the Orient has been diverted 
from the Suez route, and the westward and eastward move- 
ments of civilization now meet and overlap. 

Cuba. — Half the area and two thirds of the white population 
of the West Indies are found in Cuba. The highlands of the 
island reach a maximum elevation of 6800 feet near the south- 
east coast. The principal crop is sugar cane, which on the lime- 
stone soils of the central provinces requires replanting but once 
in seven years. Cuba exports one sixth of the cane sugar used 
in the world. Of less value but equal fame is the tobacco of the 
Havana provinces. The coasts are generally bordered by an 
elevated coral reef, but abound in landlocked harbors. Havana, 
the metropolis of the Caribbean province, on an excellent harbor, 
is a clean and beautiful city of 350,000 people. Cuba, with a 
population of 2,628,000, is an independent republic under the 
protection of the United States. 

Haiti, the Hispaniola of Columbus, is traversed by four parallel moun- 
tain ranges with peaks above 10,000 feet, and is naturally one of the most 
magnificent and attractive of the West Indian islands. The native popu- 
lation was exterminated by the Spaniards in about fifty years and replaced 
by slaves imported from Africa. Haiti is now occupied by about 3,225,000 
negroes, organized in two independent republics. White men are denied 
civil and political rights. Industry and commerce are greatly hampered 
by bad government. 

Porto Rico, now a territory of the United States, resembles Cuba in 
products and people. It is densely populated (1,246,000) and highly cul- 
tivated. It is better adapted to the growing of high-grade coffee than any 
other crop, but the coffee produced is exceeded in value by the sugar and 
tobacco. 

Jamaica, called from its position " the key of the Caribbean," is famous 
for beautiful scenery and delightful winter climate. The Blue Mountains 
rise above 7000 feet. Its special products — rum, ginger, and pimento — 
are now being displaced in commercial importance by bananas, oranges, 



496 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

tobacco, and cacao. About 05 per cent of the people are colored and are 
peaceful and prosperous under British rule. 

The Lesser Antilles extend in a sweeping curve of about 1500 miles from 
Porto Rico to Point Gallinas on the South American coast. Most of them 
are true oceanic islands of volcanic and coral structure. All the West 
Indies, except Cuba and Porto Rico, are overwhelmingly African in popu- 
lation. They are at present in a state of commercial decline as a result of 
the abolition of slavery and the competition of European beet sugar. 
They suffer also from being politically divided. The coast margin of 
South America is the outlet for the rich coffee and cocoa plantations of 
Venezuela and Colombia. 

On account of its position, climate, salubrity, fertility, and 
variety of products, the Caribbean province is by nature com- 
petent to supply North America with all kinds of distinctly 
tropical products. That its possibilities have never been realized 
is due to human rapacity, political jealousy, and economic mis- 
management. It is reasonable to hope that the opening of the 
Panama Canal and the expanding influence of the United States 
may enable it to occupy the place in the economy of the world 
which naturally belongs to it, 



CHAPTER XXXIV 

INTERTROPICAL PROVINCES OF SOUTH AMERICA 

The Brazilian Province. — The larger part of Brazil is a high- 
land 700,000 square miles in area and forming an "island" 
surrounded by the ocean and the continuous valleys of the 
Amazon-Madeira and Paraguay-Parana rivers. Near the south- 
eastern coast it is bordered by a mountain system which 
reaches a height of 10,000 feet. Behind the mountains denuded 
plateaus descend westward from 4000 or 5000 feet to 2500 feet. 
Many of the " serras " or mountain ranges shown on the map 
are flat-topped escarpments of the plateau. The eastern slopes 
have a heavy rainfall and are forested. The interior is dry 
and occupied by campos (p. 237) and catinga (p. 234). The 
large stream valleys are wooded. Much of the interior of the 
" Brazilian island " is uninhabited and unexplored. 

Coffee Culture. — The Brazilian plateau produces about 1800 million 
pounds of coffee annually, or three fourths of the world's crop. The coffee 
district lies just north of the tropic and within 200 miles of the sea, at an 
elevation of about 2000 feet. The soil is laterite (p. 145), produced by the 
decay of eruptive rocks rich in potash and iron, and locally called terra 
rossa (red earth). The region is near the southern edge of the equatorial 
belt, with about half the year hot and half temperate. The rainfall is 
between 40 and 60 inches, three fourths of which is brought by the equa- 
torial calms between October and March. The summer, therefore, is the 
wet growing season, and the dry, warm winter, when the trade wind blows, 
is the season for harvesting and curing. The fruit of the coffee tree is a 
red berry about the size of a small cherry and containing two seeds. The 
pulp is removed by soaking in water, and the seeds are dried in the open 
air on cemented or tiled floors painted black to increase the absorption of 
heat from the generally unclouded sun. After drying, which requires from 
one to many days, according to the weather, the grains are run through 

497 



498 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

a machine which removes the hulls, assorted, and put up in bags weighing 
132 pounds. The labor on the coffee plantations is now performed mostly 
by Italian colonists. 

Cities of Brazil. — The Brazilian province exemplifies the rule 
that in tropical America the largest cities are, with few excep- 
tions, situated upon the plateau, while the seaports are relatively- 
small. Sao Paulo, 32 miles from the sea and 2500 feet above it, 
has a population of 400,000; its seaport, Santos, the greatest 
coffee-shipping port in the world, has but 35,000. Of the eleven 
independent nations of intertropical America, but one, Brazil, has 
a capital which is at sea level, Rio de Janeiro (1,128,000). This 
contrast with the countries of temperate climates suggests the 
possibilities of future development of tropical lowlands, when, 
by the application of science, their peculiar diseases may be 
eliminated and the depressing effects of their climate relieved. 

The Orinoco Province comprises the highlands of Guiana, Venezuela, 
and northern Brazil and the llanos of Venezuela and Colombia. The 
highlands form a plateau rising by precipitous escarpments to 8000 feet. 
They are covered with tropical forests and savannas and are inhabited only 
by a few Indians and fugitive negroes. The llanos (p. 237) are low plains 
lying in the rain shadow of the highlands and including some tracts of 
sandy desert. Most of the area is clothed with luxuriant grass. The 
winters are hot, but so dry that nearly all vegetation dies. The chief occu- 
pation of the people is cattle raising. 

The Andean Province. — The Andean Cordillera north of the tropic 
consists of two or more parallel ranges separated by high plateaus. The 
system is studded with knots of giant volcanoes (Fig. 56), some above 
20,000 feet, and covered with perpetual snow even under an equatorial sun. 
Earthquakes are frequent and violent. The intermont valleys are divided 
by transverse spurs into a series of basins with floors between 8000 and 
13,000 feet above the sea, most of which are drained through canons east- 
ward to the Amazon. The largest basin, about 300 miles long and 100 
miles wide, contains Lake Titicaca, 50 by 130 miles in extent, and 12,545 
feet above the sea. This mountain system stretches a band of cool tem- 
perate to polar climate, 2500 miles long and 250 miles wide, across the 
equatorial belt. The rainfall brought by the trade winds is heavy on the 



INTERTROPICAL PROVINCES OF SOUTH AMERICA 499 

eastern slope, scanty on the plateaus, and next to nothing on the western 
slope. The conditions are similar to those of the Mexican province, but 
on an exaggerated scale. 

• Aboriginal Andean People. — The Andean plateaus were the seat of an 
aboriginal civilization in some respects superior to that of Mexico. The 
people cultivated corn and the potato, indigenous to the region, both of 
which attained a perfection unknown elsewhere. The almost intractable 
llama (Fig. 222) was domesticated as a beast of burden, and herds of 
alpacas and vicunas, pastured on the luxuriant ichu grass which clothed 
the lower slopes, were kept for flesh and wool. Gold, silver, copper, and 
tin were plentiful, and the best implements were of bronze. 

Under three centuries of Spanish oppression and plunder, the native 
population of 10,000,000 was reduced to less than 1,000,000. Early in the 
nineteenth century the people threw off the Spanish yoke and organized 
the present Andean republics. Three fourths of the population are of 
Indian blood, but, owing to centuries of isolation and slavery, remain in a 
condition inferior to that of the Mexicans. The native economic basis of 
corn, potatoes, grass, llamas, alpacas, and vicunas has been extended by 
the introduction of wheat, cattle, donkeys, and horses. The Andean prov- 
ince contains some of the richest deposits of silver, copper, tin, and mer- 
cury in the world. Since the beginning of Spanish possession, the hill of 
Potosi has yielded silver to the value of $1,500,000,000. Many of the 
mines can be reached only by mule trails over passes 10,000 feet or more 
in height, and are difficult to develop. 

Previous to the completion of the railroad in Ecuador, about 1,000,000 
people were dependent for connection with the outside world upon a sin- 
gle dangerous mule trail, and had hardly any foreign commerce. The 
people of the Andean province exist in a state of naturally extreme isola- 
tion. In spite of great difficulties, railroads, climbing from the coast 
over passes of 15,000 feet in elevation, now penetrate the basins of Quito, 
Titicaca, and Cuzco. 

The Amazon Province. — ■ The area of equatorial forest — lying in the 
basins of the Amazon and Parana rivers in Brazil, Colombia, Peru, Bolivia, 
and Argentina — is more than half as large as the United States. It is 
accessible only by the rivers, of which the Amazon is navigable for steam- 
ers to the foot of the Andes, a distance of about 2000 miles. Its tributaries 
add as much more waterway for large craft, and an uncalculated distance 
for small boats. It is sparsely populated by native tribes of Indians in 
a state of savagery more or less modified by contact with the whites. 



5°° 



REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 



There are no towns except a few trading posts. Manioc and fish are the 
staple articles of food. Manioc is cultivated in rude fashion and the roots 
are ground, washed, pressed, and dried into a cake, which is sometimes 
ground into flour. The principal commercial product is rubber, gathered 
from several species of wild trees, and exported chiefly from Para, at tht 
mouth of the Amazon. This province furnishes about three fifths of the 
world's supply. 



CHAPTER XXXV 

INTERTROPICAL PROVINCES OF ASIA AND AFRICA 

The Dekkan, or " southland," forms the core of the peninsula 
of India. It is a triangular plateau bordered on the west by 
the steep seaward' escarpment of the Ghats (steps), 4000 to 
6000 feet high, and sloping to a narrow coastal plain on the 
east. A belt of hilly country separates it from the Ganges 
plain. The northwestern third of it is covered by ancient lava 
sheets, which have weathered into a rich black soil. The re- 
mainder is composed of eruptive and metamorphic rocks which 
produce laterite. There are some valuable coal fields in the 
north. The temperature is tropical, modified by elevation and 
subject to a range of 25 degrees. The rainfall brought by the 
southwest monsoon of summer, screened off by the Ghats, 
averages on the plateau from 20 to 40 inches, but is variable 
and uncertain from year to year. The northeast monsoon of 
winter brings light rain to the eastern margin. The Ghats and 
hills are wooded; the rest of the plateau is a savanna, green 
during the rainy season, brown, bare, dusty, and very hot in 
spring and early summer. The natural conditions are essen- 
tially similar to those of the Mexican plateau. 

The basin of the Ganges and lower Brahmaputra lies between 
the Dekkan and the Himalayas, opening southward to the Bay 
of Bengal. It is an alluvial and delta plain about four times 
as large as that of the Mississippi. The summer monsoons 
sweep up the valley bringing a deluge of rain, amounting in the 
east to 50 or 60 feet a year, the heaviest in the world. More 
rain sometimes falls in one day than in the northeastern United 
States in a whole year. Three fourths of the rainfall occurs in 
three summer months, and the winter and spring are dry. The 

Soi 



502 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

plain is traversed by many rivers which rise in the mountains. 
These conditions account for extensive irrigation works (p. 148) 
in a region of heavy rainfall. 

India. — The Dekkan, the Ganges plain, and some bordering 
territory constitute the empire of India, of which the British 
king is sovereign. An area little more than half as large as the 
United States supports a population of 315,000,000, the density 
in many parts exceeding 500 to the square mile. About half the 
area is arable, 6 per cent of which is under irrigation. Two 
thirds of the people are engaged in agriculture, carried on by 
village communities, which cultivate the same land through 
successive generations. Rice, wheat, millet, beans, and cotton 
are the principal crops. Cattle are the most numerous domestic 
animals and are used for milk and draft. The eating of flesh 
is forbidden by the religion which many of the people profess. 
Fine cotton goods and sacking and cordage made from jute are 
the largest factory products. Jute, cotton, rice, wheat, oil 
seeds, hides, tea, and opium are exported. The large rivers, 
canals, 32,000 miles of railroad, and about 200,000 miles of 
improved wagon roads furnish internal communication. 

People of India. — The aboriginal inhabitants of India were 
Dra vidians, a very ancient people whose origin and racial affini- 
ties are uncertain. Successive Caucasian invasions from the 
northwest have driven them into the Dekkan and established 
"many distinct and independent communities owning no brother- 
hood of religion, language, race, or social intercourse." Ten re- 
ligions and twenty-five languages are officially recognized. The 
overpopulation of the empire and the consequent occasional 
famines are due in part to the peace and good order maintained 
among these discordant elements by British rule. The govern- 
ment is administered by a Viceroy and subordinate officials, 
the total British population being less than 100,000, of whom 
more than 75,000 are soldiers. The climate is very unhealthful 
for Europeans, who, as far as possible, leave the lowlands in 
summer. Calcutta (1,222,000), on a distributary of the Ganges, 



INTERTROPICAL PROVINCES OF ASIA 



503 



Bombay (979,000), and Madras (519,000) are the principal cities 
and seaports. Some of the ancient cities, such as Delhi, Agra, 




Fig. 363. — Street scene, Jaipur, India. 

and Benares, are famous for beautiful architecture and as cen- 
ters of religious veneration. 

Indo-China. — The peninsula of Indo-China occupies a position in Asia 
corresponding to that of the Caribbean province in North America. The 
complex relief and outline of the land are due to parallel mountain ranges, 
separated by the valleys of great rivers, which thrust out deltas into the 
sea. Tropical and monsoon forests and bamboo jungle prevail, with 
savannas in protected localities. The valleys are densely populated by 
various Mongolian peoples, who live along and upon the rivers, which fur- 
nish almost the only practicable routes of travel. The staple products are 
rice in the valleys, and millet on the uplands. The great forest resources 



504 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

of the mountains include the invaluable teak timber, which is extensively 
utilized. The elephant is used for labor and for display (Fig. 257). Siam 
is an independent kingdom, and the eastern part of the peninsula is a French 
protectorate. 

The Malay Province. — The islands of the Malay province 
present a greater variety of human than of natural conditions. 
Most of them have been in contact with Europeans for cen- 
turies, and some are under complete political and economic 
control by white men. New Guinea has been very imperfectly 
explored, and the natives are in a state of primitive savagery. 
Java has been systematically and thoroughly developed by the 
Dutch. The United States has undertaken a similar task in 
the Philippines, while the Hawaiian Islands are as highly civil- 
ized and modernized as Jamaica. 

Java, midway between Asia and Australia, holds the commanding posi- 
tion of the archipelago. It consists essentially of a line of volcanoes, 600 
miles long, which have poured out sufficient material to build a continu- 
ous island about the size of New York. Many of the volcanoes are still 
active and destructive to life and property, but the land owes its superior 
fertility to frequent showers of volcanic dust. The island is a vast plan- 
tation where the natives grow rice' for themselves and coffee, sugar cane, 
tea, quinine, and indigo for their Dutch rulers. About 40 per cent of the 
area is under cultivation, and over one half of that is devoted to rice. 
Coffee was formerly grown under a system of compulsory labor, and is 
still in part a government monopoly. Java coffees bring a high price on 
account of superior flavor. Java stands next to Cuba in the production 
of sugar. The cultivation of the cinchona tree, introduced from South 
America, now yields 86 per cent of all the bark used in the world. These 
crops, together with tea, rubber, tobacco, and indigo, receive the closest 
attention from the scientific bureaus of the government, and yield a large 
profit to the Dutch merchants. 

The population is 34,000,000, or more than half that of Australasia and 
all the intertropical islands. The density is 680 to the square mile. The 
Javanese live in villages built of bamboo and other light materials, which 
are not injured by frequent earthquakes. They are moderately industrious 
but improvident. 

The Hawaiian Islands, on the tropic, 2000 miles southwest of San 



INTERTROPICAL PROVINCES OF ASIA AND AFRICA 505 

Francisco, consist of eight large volcanic masses rising from profound ocean 
depths, and having an area about the size of Connecticut and Rhode Island. 
They are under the economic control of sugar planters, and send to the 
United States 550,000 tons of sugar annually. Their position at the cross- 
roads of the Pacific makes their possession of prime importance in the 
politics and commerce of that ocean. The native Hawaiians are the most 
advanced among Polynesian peoples, but are diminishing in numbers, 
and are now outnumbered four to one by Chinese and Japanese. 




Fig. 364. — Sugar plantation, Hawaii. 

The Kongo Province. — The equatorial forests of Africa have an area 
about the same as those of South America, chiefly in the basins of the 
Kongo and Niger, but the province is more accessible because of its 
long coast line. It is nearly all under Belgian, British, French, or Por- 
tuguese administration. The native negro population is estimated at 
about 50,000,000, which gives a density nearly equal to that of the United 
States as a whole. The climate is extremely fatal to white men. The 
region has been called the banana zone, because the means of subsistence 
lie in spontaneous fruits, of which the banana, plantain, and oil palm are in 
themselves sufficient. Domestic animals are very uncommon. Dogs are 
fattened for food, and monkey flesh is a delicacy. The coast and river 
people pay much attention to fishing. There is little hunting, except 
among the scattered tribes of pygmies, a race of dwarfs who live in the 



506 



REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 



dense forest by the chase and by bartering game for bananas. The crav- 
ing for meat and its scarcity led to the general prevalence of cannibalism, 
which Europeans have not been able entirely to suppress. 

The British and French have built short railways on the Guinea coast, 
and a Belgian road 250 miles long around the rapids of the Kongo gives 
a rail and steamer route of 1500 miles into the interior, with branches on 
the tributaries. The European exploitation of the country can hardly be 
called a development, for like native life it depends upon collective economy. 
The province furnishes more than one fourth of the world's supply of rubber. 
Other valuable exports are ivory, palm nuts and oil, gold, and timber. 
The cultivation of cotton, corn, cocoa, coffee, tobacco, and spices is en- 
couraged and meets with some success. 




Fig- 365. —Baobab tree, central Africa. (Schimper.) 

The Central African Province. — In central Africa an area about the 
size of the United States, lying between 20 S. Lat. and i5°N. Lat., has 
a general elevation between 2000 and 4000 feet. Near the eastern border 
the plateau rises to 5000 and 8000 feet, and volcanic peaks above 18,000. 
The climate is tempered according to elevation, and the rainfall, varying 
between 20 and 60 inches, is distributed in one or two rainy seasons. The 
region contains the most extensive savannas in the world. Forests occur 
along the streams, on the slopes of the mountains, and near the coast 
exposed to the trade winds. The baobab tree (Fig. 365) with its swollen 
trunk, and the peculiar candelabra-shaped euphorbias, are characteristic. 



INTERTROPICAL PROVINCES OF AFRICA 507 

The abundance of large animal life before noticed (p. 236) is in striking 
contrast with the poverty of the Brazilian province. 

People. — The province is peopled by many tribes of negro stock, mod- 
ified in the north by Caucasian admixture. Some are cattle and goat 
herders, but agriculture is the general occupation. The principal food 
crops are millet, corn, and bananas. Hoe culture is universal, animals 
being kept for flesh, milk, and hides. Clothing is at an irreducible mini- 
mum, consisting at most of a single scanty garment of skin or cotton cloth. 
Cotton growing for exportation is one of the possibilities of the future. 

Political and Economic Conditions. — The plateau of Abyssinia, in the 
extreme northeast, has been the seat of an independent empire of Cauca- 
sian and Christian people from a remote period. The rest of the province 
is now under the control of the British, French, Belgians, and Portuguese. 
Slavery has been abolished and peace and good order are maintained. 
The British territory is penetrated by four railroads, one from the east 
coast to Lake Victoria, one from the coast to Lake Tanganyika, one 
from Cape Town to the upper Kongo River, and one in the west across 
the Niger. There are some short lines in the French and Portuguese 
possessions. Habits of industry and thrift are encouraged and readily 
acquired, and the natives are being educated in agricultural and mechanic 
arts. Both Catholic and Protestant missionaries have met with considerable 
success, and much is being done to develop the resources of the country, and 
to improve the condition of the people. However, the civilization of races 
sunk for centuries in savagery cannot be accomplished in a few generations. 

The Madagascar Province. — The large island of Madagascar forms 
the only province of the Caribbean type in the southern hemisphere. It 
consists of an interior mountain range surrounded by a belt of lowland. 
The trade winds bring ample rainfall to the eastern side. The mountain 
heights and the western side are drier. The winter is relatively dry and 
cool. An almost unbroken forest borders the shores and surrounds the 
central highlands. The flora is rich, varied, and peculiar, three fourths of 
the species being unknown elsewhere. There are no large native animals, 
but Madagascar is the home of the lemurs (allied to the monkeys), chame- 
leons, and many peculiar birds. The living forms show it to be a very old 
land, long isolated, and, like Australia (p. 254), preserving types elsewhere 
extinct. The people are of mixed races, but the semicivilized descendants 
of ancient Malay invaders are dominant. The island is a French colony, 
and produces cloths, bags, and mats made by hand from a variety of 
fibers, cattle, hides, rubber, rice, timber, coffee, sugar, and vanilla. 



CHAPTER XXXVI 

TEMPERATE PROVINCES OF THE SOUTHERN HEMISPHERE 

The Plata Province. — The temperate grasslands of the south- 
ern hemisphere differ somewhat from those of the northern in 
being less clearly distinguished as savanna, steppe, and prairie. 

The pampas of Argentina and Uruguay were in recent geologic 
times the bed of an inland sea which received drainage from a 
large area to the northward and was covered with a rich, red 




Fig. 366. — Cattle ranch, Argentina. 

clay soil. Its emergence above sea level occurred so recently 
that forests and large animals have never reached it. Thus 
grasses and herbaceous plants grew and decayed almost un- 
touched for ages, adding humus to the soil. The rainfall varies 
from about 30 inches near the coast to less than 10 in the in- 
terior. The temperatures are not extreme, but violent winds 
from both north and south are frequent. Dense tufts of tall, 

508 



TEMPERATE PROVINCES OF THE SOUTHERN HEMISPHERE 509 



stiff grass rise like islets above the brown loam and bear silvery, 
plumose spikes of flowers. The bare spaces between are covered 
at certain seasons with more delicate grasses and herbaceous 
plants, forming a combination of savanna and prairie. This 
passes on toward the interior into steppe and scrub. 

Cattle and horses brought by the Spaniards from Europe, 
finding unlimited pasture and few enemies, multiplied rapidly 
in a wild state and were slaughtered for their hides only. This 
business was carried on by native Indian Gauchos, superb horse- 
men who preferred their meat cooked with the hide on. The 
breeds of stock have been greatly improved and are now raised on 
well-equipped ranches. Butter, frozen meat, tallow, hides, and 
extracts of beef are exported in large quantities from the moist 
eastern portion. In the drier west, sheep are more numerous 
than cattle. The province is second only to Australia in wool 
clip. As railroads are extended the grazing lands are coming more 
and more under the plow, wheat and corn being the principal 
crops. Although Argentina raises only about one fifth as much 
wheat as the United States, the home consumption is so small 
that exports are nearly as large. 
The possibilities of the country 
for food production are so great 
that it has been called the world's 
most valuable future asset. 

The Plata province, on an area 
one fourth as large as the United 
States, has a population of only 
7,600,000. There are many Ital- 
ian Colonists. BuenOS Aires Fig. 367.— The Plata estuary. 

(1,560,000), on the Plata estuary, is the largest city in the 
southern hemisphere. Montevideo (378,000) is nearer the sea 
and has a better harbor. 




The South African Province. — That part of South Africa which 
includes the provinces of Transvaal and Orange Free State lies upon a 
plateau 4000 feet above the sea. The winters are almost rainless, and the 



5i° 



REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 



country is a rather barren steppe fitted for a limited amount of grazing. 
Ostriches are bred for their plumes. The most important economic features 
are the gold mines of "the Rand" and the diamond mines of Kimberley. 
The Rand is the outcrop of beds of conglomerate called banket, 45 miles 
long, in which gold occurs not in veins or lodes, but generally diffused 
throughout the mass. It is mined like coal and extracted by the cyanide 
process (p. 303). The yield per ton is small, but the quantity of banket 
is so large, and the mining operations so certain and cheap, that the Rand 
yields more gold than any other district in the world. The annual out- 
put is now about $193,000,000, or two fifths that of the world. 




Fig. 368. — Diamond mine, Kimberley. 



About 70 square miles around Kimberley furnish nearly the whole of the 
world's supply of diamonds, amounting to more than $37,000,000 annually. 
The diamonds occur in large " pipes " or chimneys in the country rock, 
filled with a sort of blue clay, and of unknown depth. They may be old 
volcanic vents. 

The native Kafirs, formerly employed in the gold and diamond mines, 
have now been largely displaced by imported coolies from India and China. 

The Queensland Province includes most of those parts of Australia 
where the rainfall is between 10 and 20 inches. North of the tropic it is 



TEMPERATE PROVINCES OF THE SOUTHERN HEMISPHERE 511 

savanna, and south of it steppe, with areas of " bush " or thorn scrub. 
The steppe south of the tropic is the greatest sheep and wool region in the 
world, supporting about 75,000,000 sheep, and yielding one fifth of the 
world's wool supply. 

The New Zealand Province. — The East Coast of Australia 
south of the tropic is flanked by the continuous Dividing Range, 
4000 to 7000 feet high, and exposed to the southeast trade winds, 
which bring a mild and equable climate, with a rainfall of 20 to 
60 inches, heaviest in autumn. The vegetation is open, parklike 
forest of gigantic evergreen eucalyptus trees interspersed with 
savanna. The chief products are wheat, wool, and timber. 
These conditions prevail in the most densely populated parts 
of the states of Queensland, New South Wales, and Victoria, 
and of the continent. Sydney, on a spacious landlocked harbor, 
with a population of 637,000, is the third city in the southern 
hemisphere and the chief Australian port for European mail 
steamers. Melbourne has a harbor scarcely inferior to that 
of Sydney, and a population nearly as large. The people are of 
almost pure British stock, and yellow people are rigidly excluded. 

New Zealand, a mountainous and volcanic archipelago, 1000 
miles long and a little larger than Great Britain, lying 1200 
miles off the southeast coast of Australia, forms a geographic 
unit almost distinct enough to be reckoned as a miniature con- 
tinent. Longitudinal ranges traverse the islands near the west 
coast in the south and the east coast in the north. The South- 
ern Alps overhang the sea with peaks above 12,000 feet, from 
which glaciers descend almost to sea level. The coast is horded 
like Alaska (pp. 163, 164). The north island has active volca- 
noes, geysers, hot springs, and volcanic lakes. Coal and gold 
are the most important minerals. 

New Zealand is exposed to the strong westerly winds which 
bring to the west coast a rainfall as high in some places as 120 
inches. On the east side the rainfall ranges from 30 to 50 inches. 
The temperature is higher and more equable than that of the 
British Isles. Half the area is heavily forested with a peculiar 



512 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

flora, among which the kauri pine and tree ferns are conspicuous. 
The rest is open and covered with wiry grasses and native flax. 

The leading occupations are herding sheep and cattle, and 
the allied industries in cheese, butter, meat, wool, and leather. 
Many frozen sheep carcasses are exported to Great Britain. 
Auckland, Wellington, and Lyttleton are the chief seaports. 
There are no large cities. 

New Zealand is a semi-independent colony of the British 
Empire, and the colonists, numbering about 1,000,000, are almost 
entirely British. The native Maoris, physically and mentally 
the best of the Malay peoples, survive to the number of 50,000, 
but are slowly diminishing. They enjoy equal political rights 
with the whites. On account of its remote position New Zealand 
is destined to play a modest part, but it has become famous as 
a political and economic experiment station, where the most 
advanced ideas are successfully practiced. 

Tasmania, an island about as large as Scotland, 150 miles south of 
Australia, is an old mountainous plateau, rich in coal, iron, tin, and copper. 
Its climate and vegetation are similar to those of New Zealand. It is 
one of the states of the Australian Commonwealth. 

The area of Australia is almost exactly the same as that of 
the United States. While the region of less than 10 inches of 
rainfall amounts to about n per cent of the United States, it is 
44 per cent in Australia. The other 56 per cent has a population 
of about 4,000,000. Temperate South America, Australia, and 
New Zealand are largely unoccupied and undeveloped lands, 
which await a migration of people from the northern hemi- 
sphere. Such a movement is sure to result in time from the 
increase of population and overcrowding of northern lands and 
resources, and will be one of the great events of the future. 



CHAPTER XXXVII 

COLD TEMPERATE AND POLAR PROVINCES 

The cold belt with a temperate season stretches across North 
America at its widest part, and measures, from the Labrador coast 
to Bering Sea, more than 4000 miles. It includes the whole of 
the Lauren tian peneplain except the northern margin, Newfound- 
land, the Mackenzie plain, the northern Rocky Mountains, the 
Yukon plateau, and the northern Pacific coast ranges. It is 
divided into an oceanic and a continental province of very 
unequal extent. The western slope of the Pacific mountains 
is exposed to the sweep of the westerly winds from the ocean 
and has an abnormal climate for its latitude, with cool summers, 
mild winters, a range of about 20 degrees, and a rainfall reaching 
in places 190 inches, including 100 feet of snow. East of the 
mountain crest the climate is extreme, with a range of 50 to 80 
degrees and scant rainfall, raised to more than 20 inches in the 
east by cyclonic winds. The region as a whole is best charac- 
terized as the coniferous forest belt, broken by innumerable 
lakes, " muskegs," or marshes, patches of tundra and prairie, 
and in the mountains by areas of permanent ice and snow. 

The Alaskan Province. — The Pacific coast of North America, 
from the Strait of Fuca to the Alaskan peninsula, is a ragged 
belt of islands, canals, and fiords (p. 163), behind which the 
mountains stand with their feet in the sea (Fig. 106). The val- 
leys are filled with ice, which overflows in more than 200 large 
glaciers. The slopes below the snow fine, where not too steep, 
are heavily wooded with hemlock, spruce, and cedar, but the 
timber is inferior in size and quality to that farther south. 

Mining and Fisheries. — Juneau, the capital of the territory 
of Alaska, owes its existence to veins of gold-bearing quartz in 

513 



5i4 



REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 




Fig. 369. — Coast of Alaska. 

the neighboring islands, which have been worked since 1880. 
The whole province now yields about $6,260,000 a year. Copper 
mines exist, but are only beginning to be developed. Extensive 
deposits of high-grade coal occur near the coast in the extreme 
northern part, but are as yet little used. The most productive 
industry of the province is its salmon fisheries. The salmon 
are sea fish which enter every river mouth in the spring and 
ascend to the headwaters to spawn. During this journey of 
hundreds or even thousands of miles they eat nothing, and 
all die after spawning. The young fry float downstream tail 
first and go out to sea. The adult fish weigh from 10 to 100 
pounds, and are caught in the rivers with nets and traps, and 
taken to canneries established near the coast. More than 
29,000 people are employed in the business, and the value of 
the product is about $46,000,000 annually. The United States 
government has established hatcheries and enacted rules regu- 
lating the salmon industry, to prevent waste and conserve the 
supply. 

Transportation and Trade. — Several lines of ocean steam- 
ships and river boats in summer furnish regular and fairly rapid 
transportation to and from Seattle and Vancouver. Ten local 



COLD TEMPERATE PROVINCES 515 

railways, varying in length from 7 to 258 miles, connect 
important points with one another and with the coast. The 
United States government has built hundreds of miles of stage 
roads and established cable and telegraph lines to all the 
principal centers in the territory of Alaska. Mail service is 
maintained throughout the year. The total exports of the 
territory of Alaska amounted in 191 8 to about $87,000,000, and 
the imports to more than $44,000,000. Nearly all of this trade 
was with the United States. These amounts will certainly 
increase indefinitely in the future, but the greatest, most gen- 
erally available, and only inexhaustible resource of the country 
cannot be estimated in dollars, and lies in its magnificent scenery 
of sea, fiord, mountain, forest, cataract, and glacier. 

The Norwegian Province. — In Europe the high western 
coast of the Scandinavian peninsula surpasses the Alaskan 
province in the number and magnitude of its fiords and in the 
countless islands which guard it from the waves. The oceanic 
winds bring to it an even more equable climate and a heavy rain 
and snow fall. Owing to the lower altitude of the plateaus and 
mountains, the snow fields and glaciers are much less extensive. 
Land resources are scant, and the inhabitants have always been 
compelled to take to the sea. In the Middle Ages they were 
sea rovers and pirates, and in modern times are sailors and fish- 
ermen. The cod and herring fisheries, of which the Lofoden 
Islands are the chief center, employ a larger proportion of the 
people than in any other country. Timber of excellent quality 
is exported. Norway has water power enough to run the 
machinery of the world. It is beginning to be utilized, and in 
the future this province may become a great manufacturing 
district. 

The Scotch Highlands exhibit all the natural features of Nor- 
way, except glaciers, on a small scale. In beauty of scenery and 
number of summer visitors, Norway and Scotland stand second 
only to the Alps. 



516 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

The Southwest American Province. — Chile, from 40 S. Lat. south- 
ward, presents a high, glaciated mountain chain, cut by fiords and 
canals into a swarm of islands, all of the genuine Alaskan type. Owing to 
the cold west wind drift in the Pacific, the temperatures are lower 
than in the corresponding northern latitudes, and the climate is very 
stormy at all seasons. In Tierra del Fuego snow falls every month in the 
year, yet no month is too cold for the native inhabitants to go almost 
without clothing or shelter. The population of degraded savages is very 
small, and the conditions of human life are probably more miserable than 
in any other inhabited land. 

The Canadian Province. — The Lake Superior iron district 
has been discussed in Chap. XXV. (p. 369). The economic 
basis of the permanent inhabitants of the rest of the Cana- 
dian province lies chiefly in its animal life, which is very 
abundant. The number of species of birds and mammals in 
summer equals that of any part of the temperate zone. They 
include the moose, the largest mammal in North America, 
caribou, musk ox, wood bison, several species of bear, puma, 
lynx, and mountain sheep and goats. These make the country 
famous as a hunting ground for sportsmen. A herd of 30,000 
musk oxen has been seen on the east side of Hudson Bay, and 
50,000 caribou have been known to cross the Yukon at Caribou 
Crossing. As many as 80,000 caribou skins have been bought 
by traders in a single year. In winter these animals feed upon 
the " moss " or air plants which grow upon the trees in the forest, 
and in summer they migrate to the tundra. Caribou meat and 
skins furnish the staple materials for food and clothing. The 
lakes and rivers abound in excellent fish, which form a food 
supply for great numbers of small fur-bearing animals. 

Trapping and Hunting. — The population of nearly the whole 
Canadian province consists of Indians and half-breeds, engaged 
in trapping, hunting, and bartering to white traders the furs which 
constitute the chief product of the country at present market- 
able. The Hudson's Bay Company has maintained for 250 
years forts or trading posts throughout the region for the pur- 



COLD TEMPERATE PROVINCES 517 

pose of collecting furs. In summer steamers on the large rivers 
make regular trips from post to post, but travel is mostly by 
canoe. 

The Indian birch-bark canoe is one of the most remarkable achievements 
of savage man. The bark of the paper birch is stripped off in large sheets 
as thin as cardboard and sewed to a light wooden frame, the seams being 
made water-tight by means of pitch. The finished canoe has beautifully 
curved outlines, and is of such shape as to move through the water with 
little resistance. It will carry a load of 1000 pounds, yet is so light that 
a man can carry it easily across the numerous portages from stream to 
stream. The Indians display great skill in paddling and steering this fragile 
craft through rapids, where to graze a rock means disaster. Travel in win- 
ter over the heavy mantle of snow is possible only on snowshoes, which 
are almost as ingenious in construction as the canoe, and might be called 
snow boats. An elliptical frame of wood a foot and a half wide, and from 
three to six feet long, is covered with a network of rawhide, in the middle 
of which the wearer stands with his toes inserted in a loop or pocket. The 
snowshoe is not lifted but slid forward at each step, and prevents the 
wearer from sinking, while any snow upon the top falls through the meshes. 
Transportation is by dog sledges. A team of ten dogs will draw a load of 
1000 pounds twenty miles a day. 

Lumbering. — The Canadian forest is one of the most valu- 
able in the world. Its vast resources are as yet but little utilized, 
but, with the rapidly diminishing supply in the United States, 
must be more and more largely drawn upon. Lumbering is 
carried on chiefly along the southeastern margin, where logs 
can be floated down the numerous streams to the lakes and the 
St. Lawrence. 

The Canadian Pacific Railway traverses the province from 
Montreal to Winnipeg, and the Grand Trunk Pacific is under 
construction from Quebec along a line farther to the north. 

Mining. — The native animal and human life of the Canadian 
province has not been seriously disturbed by the fur trader, 
whose interest it is to conserve the population and make it as 
productive of wealth as possible. The lumbermen do not 
penetrate far into the forest because timber cut in remote parts 



518 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

cannot be got to market. The case is far different with the 
miner. The whole country, as far as explored, is very rich in 
minerals, of which gold, silver, copper, and iron have been ex- 
tensively mined. Of these, gold, on account of its high value 
in small bulk, is utilizable wherever found, and a strong man can 
carry $20,000 worth on his back. 

Gold has been mined in Alaska and British Columbia for fifty years, but 
the history of the Klondike gold field on the upper Yukon is the most 
interesting and typical. Mining began there in 1896, and the gravel 
along many streams was found to be very rich. 

The gold occurs in the form of fine dust or small grains or nuggets 
disseminated in alluvial sand and gravel, from which it is separated by 
washing. Along the Yukon the gravel is frozen to the bottom, a distance 
of fifteen to forty feet. The upper layers thaw out in summer but contain 
little gold. The gravel has to be thawed by building a fire upon it, shovel- 
ing out the loosened material, and building another fire in the bottom of 
the hole. In this way the rich bottom deposits are reached and taken 
out by running tunnels in all directions. Washing is done only in summer, 
when water is plentiful. The simplest process is by " panning." An 
iron pan is filled with gravel and water, and, by skillful shaking, rinsing, 
and pouring, the dirt is washed out, leaving the heavier particles of gold 
in the bottom of the pan. The work is done more rapidly by means of 
a " cradle " or " rocker," which is a wooden box open at one end and 
mounted so that it can be rocked while water is poured in. The same 
object is accomplished on a larger scale by "sluicing," or running a stream 
of water over gravel in a long trough. The most improved mining ma- 
chinery is now in use. 

The Klondike field yielded, up to 1918, gold to the value of about 
$196,000,000, as much as $22,000,000 having been taken out in one year. 

Most of the stream gravels of the Yukon plateau contain gold, and in 
many fields sufficient to make mining profitable. The most important of 
these are the Iditarod and Fairbanks districts on southern tributaries of 
the Yukon in Alaska, which yield about $7,500,000 annually. Here the 
city of Fairbanks is provided with all the conveniences of civilized life, — 
electric light, telephone, mail service, water supply, banks, churches, and 
newspapers, — and is the principal commercial center of interior Alaska. 
In a district on the coast of the Seward peninsula, of which Nome is the 
center, gold is obtained from the sands of the seashore and coastal plain 
to the amount of $3,000,000 annually. 



COLD TEMPERATE AND POLAR PROVINCES 519 

Fisheries. — To the Canadian province belong some of the 
most productive marine fishing grounds in the world. The 
wide continental shelf, including the Gulf of St. Lawrence and 
the banks of Newfoundland, covered with shallow, cold water, 
is the feeding ground of myriads of cod, halibut, herring, and 
mackerel, which furnish occupation for a large part of the coast 
population. Hundreds of vessels from Canadian and United 
States ports go out every season to catch and cure fish. Cod 
are caught with trawls, which are lines sometimes half a mile 
long, anchored at the ends, and carrying hooks about four feet 
apart. Men go out every day in small boats to take off the fish 
and rebait the hooks, and are often prevented by fog and storm 
from regaining their vessel. 

The Siberian Province. — In Eurasia a region in almost every respect 
the counterpart of the Canadian province stretches from the Baltic to 
the Pacific. West of the Yenisei River it is a low plain, very poorly drained, 
covered with coniferous forest and inhabited by fur-bearing animals. East 
of the Yenisei it is diversified with hills, plateaus, and mountains, termi- 
nating in the great volcanic chain of Kamchatka. The Arctic rivers are 
choked with ice most of the year, and their valleys are subject to great 
inundations in the spring. None are of much value for navigation except 
the Amur, which on account of its southerly position is more open, and 
leads to the Pacific. Lake Baikal, about half the size of Lake Superior, 
is the largest body of fresh water in Eurasia, and the deepest in the world. 
Northern Sweden contains immense deposits of high-grade iron ore. Along 
the southern border of the province in Asia, and in the Ural Mountains, 
a rich mineral belt yields gold, silver, platinum, iron, and coal. The 
Siberian Railway skirts the southern boundary as the Canadian Pacific 
does that of the Canadian province (p. 455). 

The American Arctic Province. — The northern part of 
North America, including most of the Arctic archipelago, is a 
lowland underlain by ground perpetually frozen to the depth 
of 100 feet or more. The surface thaws during the short sum- 
mer, but for want of underdrainage remains soft and marshy. 
This region forms the tundra, locally known as the " barren 
grounds." There are no trees, but a carpet of mosses and 



520 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

lichens, with a few herbaceous plants and stunted shrubs, covers 
the ground. In winter the whole is blanketed with several feet 
of snow. Such vegetation renders some abundance of animal 
life possible. Musk oxen, hares, wolves, bears, and foxes are 
permanent inhabitants, and large herds of caribou find here 
summer pasture. Flights of wild fowl, geese, ducks, and divers 
sometimes darken the air. They arrive in May, nest and breed 
in the marshes, and depart southward in September. They 
are accompanied and preyed upon by hawks and eagles. 

The musk ox and caribou possess special adaptations to their environ- 
ment. Their food consists chiefly of the so-called "reindeer moss," a species 
of lichen. Their hoofs, which are spreading, curved and concave beneath, 
with sharp edges, give a foothold on slippery surfaces, prevent sinking in 
the snow, and form an efficient implement for scraping away the snow in 
search of food. The musk ox is enabled to endure any degree of cold by 
his winter undercoat of dense, fine wool, and overcoat of very long hair. 

The tundra is the home of a few Eskimos, who wander inland from the 
coast, but it has been invaded by Indians from the south. 

The Eurasian Arctic Province. — Arctic Eurasia is a lowland tundra 
like that of Arctic America, and is inhabited by various tribes, similar to 
the Eskimos in race, character, and habits of life. They are nearly all 
subjects of the Russian Empire. The Lapps of northern Europe keep 
large herds of domestic reindeer for draft, flesh, and milk, and for that 
reason are the most advanced of Polar peoples. 

The Greenland Province. — The Greenland ice moves slowly outward 
toward the coasts and sends glacial tongues through numerous fiords to 
the sea. The discharged icebergs form a barrier which renders access to 
the east coast exceedingly difficult. They drift southward, and in the spring 
often interfere with the traffic between America and Europe, before they 
finally melt in the warm waters of the Gulf Stream. The ice floes which 
cover the Arctic Ocean in winter, and never break up completely, constitute 
a portion of the rock sphere, many feet in thickness, floating upon the 
water, and may be considered as a peculiar part of the land. The land and 
sea ice are incapable of supporting life of any kind. The sea constitutes 
the base of supplies. In its waters minute floating organisms are abun- 
dant and furnish food, for fish, which in turn support mammals and great 



POLAR PROVINCES 



521 



flocks of sea birds. The birds migrate southward in winter, but the seal, 
walrus, and polar bear are permanent inhabitants of the water and sea 
ice. The bare, rocky cliffs of the coast afford a perching place for birds 
and men, and the ice-free areas of land at the north support herds of musk 
oxen and caribou. Timber is obtained from the driftwood originally 
brought to the sea by the American and Asiatic rivers. Metals are obtained 
only from foreign visitors. 

Under these hard conditions human life is reduced nearly to its lowest 
terms, but is maintained by about 10,000 Eskimos, originally Mongolian 




Fig. 370. — Dog sledge and kayak, Greenland. 



emigrants from Asia. Agriculture in any form is impossible, and vegetable 
food is scarcely known. Men must live, if at all, much as the other animals 
do. The seal is their main dependence for food, clothing, and fuel. The 
necessities of seal hunting have developed a remarkable degree of ingenuity 
and skill. It is carried on largely by means of the kayak, a long, narrow 
boat made of skins and completely closed except for a hole in the deck, 
which permits the hunter to sit on the bottom. His skin jacket is fastened 
to the margin of the hole in such a manner as to render the boat practically 
a water-tight, floating garment. The kayak is managed with a paddle 
and is easily capsized, but the experienced kayaker is able to right himself 
without serious inconvenience. Seals are captured by means of a wooden 
harpoon, with a detachable head of bone or metal. An inflated skin is tied 



522 REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 

to the harpoon head by a long rawhide line, and, as the seal dives, serves 
to show in what direction he goes. The walrus and polar bear are killed 
with harpoons and spears. Their flesh is used for food and their skins for 
rugs, beds, and tents. Walrus tusks are of value for harpoon heads. Fish 
and birds are caught with nets and small darts. 

For clothing the Eskimos add animal skins to their own. Bird skins 
with the feathers turned inward form comfortable underclothing. Jacket, 
trousers, and boots of seal skin, single or double, arc worn by men and 
women. For housing, the Eskimos make use of the materials which are 
most abundant, snow and ice, and find them admirably adapted to their 
needs. An igloo, or snow hut, can be built by three men in an hour. Two 
men cut half -frozen snow into blocks and carry them to a third man, who, 
standing in the center, lays up a circular wall, the circumference of which 
is gradually diminished until a dome is completed at about his own height. 
A small opening is made at the bottom and protected by a covered passage, 
through which the occupants crawl in. A seal-oil lamp or two burning 
inside soon causes some of the snow to melt; the water, soaking outward, 
freezes, and the walls of the hut become so solid that a bear cannot break 
into it. Permanent winter houses are built of driftwood, stones, and turf, 
and in summer skin tents are used. Men, women, and children consume 
great quantities of flesh and fat; and lighting, heating, and cooking are 
done by burning oil in an open lamp made from a piece of soft stone, a 
bit of twisted moss serving for a wick. 

The Eskimo has but one friend and helper, his dog. The Eskimo dog 
is a domesticated wolf admirably adapted to the conditions of Arctic life. 
He is strong, hardy, impervious to cold, and can live upon one frozen 
fish a day. He curls up on the snow, lays his bushy tail over his nose, 
and sleeps in any weather. He is almost indispensable in an attack upon 
a bear, and is an efficient draft animal. A sledge is made of driftwood 
and whale or walrus bones bound together with thongs of hide or sinew, 
and capable of carrying a load of several hundred pounds. A team of 
ten dogs, each attached to the sledge by a separate thong, will draw the 
hunter over a good ice or snow surface seventy miles a day. Dog driving 
is as much of an art as kayaking. The driver controls his team by words 
of command enforced with a whip short in the handle, but having a lash 
long enough to reach the farthest dog, and wielded with great skill. 

The men fish, hunt on sea, ice, and land, make harpoons and spears* 
drive when traveling, and build the huts. The women cut up and cook 
the game, dress and prepare the skins, which they render soft and pliable 
by persistent chewing, make clothing with bone needles and sinew threads, 



POLAR PROVINCES 523 

construct kayaks and large open boats for family use, and take care of the 
children. Family life is generally happy and children are kindly treated. 
The feast which follows a successful hunt is shared by all the neighbors. 
The Eskimos are naturally peaceable, honest, and truthful, and crime is 
almost unknown. They roam about a good deal, because they are compelled 
to use the resources of a large territory. They " live upon the farthest 
edge of things," and their life is so nicely adjusted to their environment that 
any interference with it is apt to disturb the balance to their detriment. 
The introduction of firearms, steel knives, and other civilized weapons and 
utensils should be of great benefit .to them, but a fixed abode, " white men's " 
clothing, and wooden houses warmed with coal stoves, often prove dis- 
astrous. Native habits of life are extremely unsanitary according to 
civilized standards, but departure from them and contact with white men 
render the Eskimos less hardy, and have introduced lung diseases which 
prove very fatal. Civilization is likely to result in the decline and per- 
haps final disappearance of the race. Destruction of the seal by white 
hunters threatens to destroy the economic basis of Eskimo life. 

Greenland belongs politically to the kingdom of Denmark, and a few 
Danish officials and missionaries, with their families, reside on the west 
coast. Greenland has been used as a station and point of departure by 
many Arctic explorers, and it was only by help of the Eskimos and their 
dogs that Admiral Peary was enabled to make so many journeys in 
that region and finally to reach the North Pole. 

The Antarctic Province. — Since 1898 a number of exploring expeditions 
have visited the Antarctic regions. The first winter passed on the continent 
by human beings was in 1899. In 1901-1904 Captain Scott spent two 
winters in land travel. In 1908 Sir Ernest Shackleton located the posi- 
tion of the south magnetic pole and reached a point 113 miles from the 
geographical South Pole. On December 16, ion, Captain Amundsen, 
after a sledge journey of 870 miles, attained the South Pole. A few days 
later, on January 7, 191 2, Captain Scott also reached the South Pole. 
As a result of these explorations, the Antarctic province is now known to 
contain a continental land mass, covered with snow and ice and bordered 
in most places by a barrier of floating ice several hundred feet thick. South 
of New Zealand a gulf of open water extends nearly to 8o° S. Lat. and is 
bordered by a high plateau. At 85 S. Lat. a mountain range, with peaks 
15,000 feet high, extends toward South America. The pole is situated upon 
a plateau at a height of 10,500 feet. The climate, even at that elevation, 
was not found to be very severe. Land life is more meager than in Green- 
land. The shores are occupied by penguins (Fig. 211) and other sea birds. 



THE ECONOMIC STANDING OF THE PRINCIPAL COUNTRIES OF THE 

WORLD. 

(Statistics based chiefly on Statistical Abstract of the United States for 1918 and the States- 
man's Year Book for 191 9.) 



Country. 



North America. 
United States 

Alaska 

Porto Rico 

Canada 

Mexico 

Central America 

Cuba 

Haiti and Dominican 

Republic 

Other West Indies .... 

South America. 

Argentina 

Bolivia 

Brazil 

Chile... 

Colombia 

Ecuador 

Guiana 

Paraguay 

Peru 

Uruguay 

Venezuela 

Europe. 

United Kingdom 

France 

Belgium 

Netherlands 

Denmark 

Sweden 

Norway 

Switzerland 

Italy 

Spain 

Portugal 

Germany* 

Austria* 

Hungary* 

Czechoslovakia*. 

Jugoslavia* 

Roumania* 

Bulgaria* 

Albania* 

Greece* 

Constantinople'' 

Russia in Europe* .... 
Ukraine* 



Area, 
Sq. Mi. 



3,088,519 

590,884 

3,435 
3,729,665 

767,323 

208,339 

44,-2i8 

30,397 
13,973 



1,153,419 
5i4,iS5 

3,280,905 
289,796 
435,278 
118,627 
167,540 
165,000 
683,321 
72,172 
393,476 



121,438 

212,822 

11,760 

13,199 

* 16,585 
i73,oo8 
124,675 

15,945 

*i 23,000 

195,057 

35,5oi 

179,500 

31,700 

36,500 

54,7oo 

95,ooo 

113,900 

39,100 

8,450 

57,4O0 

275 

1,598,000 

197,000 



105,000,000 

64,000 
1,246,000 
8,361,000 
15,502,000 
5,747,000 
2,628,000 

3,225,000 
2,188,000 



8,284,000 
2,890,000 
26,542,000 
3,870,000 
5,473,000 
1,323,000 
455,000 
1,000,000 
4,620,000 
1,379,000 
2,828,000 



46,089,000 

41,000,000 

7,575,000 

6,583,000 

*2, 987, OOO 
5,758,000 
2,509,000 
3,880,000 

*37, 000,000 

20,730,000 

5,958,000 

60,000,000 

6,500,000 

8,500,000 

13,500,000 

11,000,000 

16,000,000 

4,300,000 

620,000 

6,300,000 

1,040,000 

81,000,000 

30,000,000 



Density. 



35- 

363- 
2.24 
20. 
27.6 
59-4 

100. 
156. 



7- 

5-6 

8. 

13-36 
12-57 
n-5 

2.7 

6. 

6.7 
19. 

7.2 



379-5 

192.5 

644. 

498.75 

180. 
33-28 
20.12 

243-4 

300. 

106.28 

167.83 

335- 

205. 

232. 

247. 

H5-7 

140. 
no. 

73-3 
109.7 

50.7 
152.2 



Railways, 
Miles. 



Foreign 
Commerce. 



266,381 

455 

34o 

37,434 

15,840 

2,179 

2,359 

548 



21,880 

1.354 

17,477 

5,ios 

708 

365 

255 
1,724 
1,601 

533 



23,709 

31,958 
5,451 
2,113 
2,556 
9,303 
i,979 
3,660 

11,891 
9,354 
1,854 

35,ooo 
5,300 
5,400 

10,700 
5,000 
9,ioo 
1,824 

1,500 

30,000 
3.4O0 



$ 8,784,217,000 

ti 1,827,000,000 

131,000,000 

137,683,000 

2,502,550,000 

222,971,000 

88,819,000 

611,936,000 

68,053,000 
60,872,000 



883,967,000 

45,856,000 

507,998,000 

380,333,000 

59,677,000 

19,930,000 

72,385,000 

9,181,000 

156,440,000 

112,073,000 

45.353.ooo 



7,404 
6,478 
1,691 

1,551; 

422. 
722, 
624, 

931, 

1,928 

517, 

104, 



706,000 
384,000 
775,000 
745,000 

238,000 
245,000 
210,000 
460,000 
368,000 
537,000 
195,000 



* Estimated. 



t 1919- 



524 



ECONOMIC STANDING OF COUNTRIES 



525 



Country. 



Europe — Continued 

Poland* 

Finland* 

Esthonia* 

Letvia* 

Lithuania* 

Danzig* 

Asia. 

China 

Japanese Empire 

British India 

Other British Asia 

Siam 

French Indo-China 

Afghanistan* 

Persia* 

Turkey* 

Russia in Asia* 

Philippines 

Dutch East Indies 

Syria and Palestine*. . . 

Mesopotamia* 

Hedjaz* 

Arabia* 

Armenia* 

Africa. 
Egypt 

Inhabited area 

Sudan 

Union of South Africa. . 
British East Africa*. . . . 
British West Africa* . . . 

Kongo Free State* 

Morocco 

Algeria and Tunis 

Madagascar 

Other French Territory* 

Portuguese Africa 

Liberia 

Libia 

Abyssinia 

Australasia. 

Australia 

New Zealand 

British Islands 

French Islands 



Area 
Sq. Mi. 



150,000 

128,000 

i9,7SO 

20,000 

18,500 

730 



4,278,352 

24S,SSi 
1,802,657 
169,826 
195,000 
256,196 
240,900 
612,000 
160,000 
6,656,096 
115,026 
739,545 
H4,530 
143,250 
96,500 
954,000 
103,500 



383,900 
12,013 
984,520 
792,340 
786,500 
45i,5oo 
913,127 
169,576 
270,432 
228,600 
3,691,000 
927,292 

36,834 
406,000 
350,000 



2,974,581 

104,751 
109,073 

9,194 



Population. 



30,000,000 
3,140,000 
i,395,ooo 
1,550,000 
2,200,000 
300,000 



325,000,000 

78,622,000 

315,156,000 

9,305,000 

8,820,000 

17,250,000 
6,000,000 
9,000,000 
8,000,000 

29,694,000 
9,010,000 

47,956,ooo 
3,675,000 
2,000,000 
300,000 
1,700,000 
3,500,000 



12,569,000 

3,400,000 

6,068,000 

14,509,000 

19,608,000 

15,000,000 

6,000,000 

7,517,000 

3,512,000 

21,385,000 

7,734,ooo 

1,500,000 

530,000 

8,000,000 



4,981,000 

1,170,000 

571,000 

81,000 



Density. 



200 
24 
70 
77 

119 



76 

308 

174 

54 

45 

7o 

25 

15 

5o 

4 

78 

64 

33 

9 

3 

1 

34 



1000. 

3-45 

7.6 

18.4 

43-5 

16.4 

33-4 
28. 

15-4 
5-8 
8-3 

40. 
1-3 

23- 



1.67 
11. 1 

5-2 

9- 



Railway, 
Miles. 



6,100 
2,527 



6,467 
9,101 
36,333 
1,847 
1,210 



34 

3,260 

10,000 

757 

i,730 



Foreign 
Commerce. 



3,9i6 
1,500 
10,021 
1,618 
1,567 
1,020 

55o 
4,025 

245 

i,i5S 



24,769 
3,012 



1,031,000,000 
1,462,718,000 
1,241,672,000 
1,171,120,000 
81,176,000 
161,000,000 

74,737,000 



200,378,000 
454,470,000 



335,069,000 
24,468,000 

294,631,000 
43,560,000 

149,469,000 
22,033,000 
51,979,000 

214,915,000 
44,795,000 

102,358,000 

2,523,000 



794,971,000 
277,791,000 

11,600,000 



* Estimated. 



526 



REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY 



RANK OF LEADING COUNTRIES OF THE WORLD. 

(Including their colonies, dependencies, etc.) 



In Area. Square Miles 

i British Empire 13,500,000 

2 Russia . 8,254,000 

3 Chinese Republic 4,278,000 

4 United States 3,7g7,ooo 

5 French Republic 3,662,000 

6 Brazil 3,281,000 

7 Argentina 1,153,000 

The Land 57,156,000 

In Railroad Mileage. 

1 United States 266,387 

2 British Empire 150,000 

3 French Republic 50,000 

4 Russia* 40,000 

5 Germany* 35, 000 

6 Argentina 22,000 

7 Brazil 17,500 

The World 730,000 



In Population. 

1 British Empire 451,000,000 

2 Chinese Republic 325,000,000 

3 United States 115,000,000 

4 Russia 111,000,000 

5 French Republic 82,000,000 

6 Japanese Empire 77,000,000 

7 Germany 60,000,000 

The World ' 1,678,400,000 

In Foreign Commerce. 

1 British Empire $16,292,600,000 

2 United States 11,827,000,000 

3 French Republic 6,875,000,000 

4 Italy 1,928,368,000 

5 Belgium 1,691,775,000 

6 Netherlands 1,551,745,000 

7 Japanese Empire 1,462,718,000 

The World 52,781,000,000 



* Estimated. 



INDEX 



Aachen, 449. 
Absolute humidity, 193. 
Abyssinia, 507. 
Acapulco, 491. 
Accumulation, hills of, 59. 

plains of, 49, 52, 53. 
Acre foot, 404. 
Adaptation, of animals, 246-248. 

of plants, 226-228. 
Adelaide, 418. 
Aden, 440. 

Adirondack Mountains, 343. 
Adobe soils, 144. 
Adriatic Sea, 464, 465, 467. 
y£gean Sea, 466, 467. 
Africa, 26, 27, 30. 

coast of, 162, 167. 

provinces, countries, and products, 409, 
410. 418, 505-507, 509. 
Agassiz, Lake, 125. 
Agave, 489, 492. 
Age, of land forms, 88-91 . 

of streams, 87-88. 
Aggradation, defined, 72. 

plains of, 49, 52, 53. 
Agra, 503. 
Agriculture, 269-276, 287, 290, 304. 

in Central Africa, 507. 

in China, 483. 

in Egypt, 410. 

in France, 442. 

in Germany, 448. 

in Holland, 450-451. 

in India, 502. 

in Italy, 473. 

in Japan, 486. 

in Java, 504. 

in Mexico, 489, 492. 

in Russia, 454. 

in Spain, 478. 

in the United States, 360-366, 397, 403, 
413- 
Air (see Atmosphere), r72. 

capacity of, 193. 

composition of, 172, 173. 
Air, cooling of, 194, 195. 

density, 184. 

dust in, 138, 174. 

moisture in, 172-174, 193-216. 

pressure, 181, 184, 188. 

relation to man, 266. 

saturated, 193. 

temperature of, 1 74. 

weight of, 181. 
Alabama district of iron mining, 370. 



Alaska, 513-515, 164, 220. 

coast, map, 163. 
Alaskan Mountains, 347. 
Alaskan province, 338, 513-515. 
Alaskan type of climate, 225. 
Albania, 465. 
Albanians, 429. 
Albany, N. Y., 371. 
Alcoholic liquors, 285. 
Alencon, 443. 
Alfalfa, 398, 405. 
Algiers, 446. 
Alkali soils, 144. 
Allegheny Mountains, 345. 
Alluvial cone or fan, 81. 
Alluvial plains, 45, 47-49, 53. 

formation of, 81-83. 
Alluvial soils, 142. 
Alpaca, 282, 499. 
Alpine climate, 223, 469. 
x\lpine deserts, 240. 
Alpine economics, 470. 
Alpine glaciers, 113. 
Alpine lakes, 126. 

Alpine type of white race, 260, 429. 
Alps, 59, 468-471. 
Alsace-Lorraine, 444. 
Altoona, Pa., 371. 
Aluminum, 301. 
Amazon province, 335, 499. 
Amazon River, 100, 499. 
Amazon type of climate, 225. 
Amber, 307. 
America (see North America and South 

America). 
American Arctic province, 339, 519. 
American Interior province, 338, 391-398, 

405-408. 
American race, 257, 259. 
Amsterdam, 451, 169. 
Amur River, 519. 
Andean province, 335, 498. 
Animal migration, barriers to, 249. 
Animal power, 310, 321. 
Animal realms, 250-254. 
Animals, adaptations of, 246-248, 400. 

air breathers, 243. 

amphibious, 244. 

barriers to migration, 249. 

conditions of life on the earth, 33-35. 

desert, 400-401. 

distribution of, 249. 

domestic, 270, 277-284, 310, 321. 

effect of day and night, 14, 15. 

flesh eaters, 246, 247. 



527 



528 



INDEX 



Animals, fliers and walkers, 245. 

food of, 246-248. 

geography of, 243-254. 

plant eaters, 246, 247. 

protective coloration of, 248. 

realms of, 250-254. 

relation to man, 265. 

use of shelter, 248. 

water breathers, 243. 
Antarctica, 25-27, 31, 523. 

ice cap of, 117, 223. 
Antarctic province, 339, 31, 523. 
Anthracite coal, 312, 367. 
Anticyclone, 189, 199, 201. 
Antwerp, 446, 447. 
Apennines, 471, 472. 
Appalachian highland, 342-345. 
Appalachian Mountains, 344, 60. 
Appalachian Plateau, 345. 
Apples, 276, 364, 413. 
Aqueous rocks, 37. 
Arabia, 410. 
Arctic archipelago, 519. 
Arctic Ocean (see Sea), 151. 

coasts, 166. 
Argentina, 508-509, 499, 221, 239. 
Argon, 172, 173. 

Arizonan province, 336, 391, 400-409. 
Arizonan type of climate, 225. 
Artesian wells, 134, 135. 
Ashes, volcanic, 67. 
Asia, 26, 27, 28. 

coast of, 164, 165, 167. 

provinces, countries, and products, 398, 
481-488, 501-504, 519, 520. 
Ass, 251, 281. 
Astrakhan, 455. 

Atlantic climate of Europe, 425. 
Atlantic Ocean (see Sea), 150, 159. 

coasts, 166. 
Atlantic provinces, 356-390. 
Atmosphere (see Air), 9, 172-192. 

circulation of, 33, 34. 
Auckland, 512. 
Augusta, Ga., 105. 
Australia, 26, 27, 30. 

coast of, 162, 167. 

provinces and products, 418, 510-512, 221. 
Australian natives, 264. 
Australian realm of animals, 253. 
Austria, 461. 

Austria-Hungary, successors of, 459. 
Auvergne plateau, 441. 

Bad lands, 353. 
Baffin Land, 342. 
Baikal, Lake, 519. 
Balkan Mountains, 453, 464. 
Balkan Peninsula, 464-466. 
Baltic-Black plain, 425, 453. 
Baltic peneplain, 425. 
Baltic ports, 448, 449. 



Baltic states* 458, 459. 

Baltic type of white race, 260, 429. 

Baltimore, 385. 

Bamboo, 483, 486, 503, 504. 

Banana, 267, 269, 276, 493. 

Banket, 510. 

Banks of Newfoundland, 519. 

Baobab tree, 506. 

Bar, 80, 84, 129. 

Barbados, 440. 

Barcelona, 479. 

Barley, 271, 273, 364. 

Barmen, 449. 

Barometer, 184. 

Barren grounds, 519. 

Barrier beach, 129, 130. 

Barriers to animal migration, 249. 

Basel, 471. 

Base level, 88. 

Basin of a stream, 77. 

Basins, defined, 63. 

Bay bar, 129. 

Bayonne, N. J., 371. 

Bayous, no. 

Beaches, 129, 130. 

Beaver, 248. 

Bed rock, 37. 

Beer, 285. 

Bees, 248, 283. 

Beets, sugar, 274, 405, 446 448. 

Belfast, 439. 

Belgium, 446-447. 

Belgrade, 465. 

Benares, 503. 

Berlin, 449, 450. 

Bermuda, 440. 

Bernina and Roseg glaciers, 112. 

Bessarabia, 463. 

Bighorn River, 107. 

Birds, 245-247, 248. 

Birmingham, Ala., 370. 

Birmingham, Eng., 435. 

Bituminous coal, 312, 368. 

Black earth region, 454. 

Black Hills, 352, 353. 

Black Sea, 463, 464, 465, 466, 467. 

Block structure, 63, 64, 67. 

Blue Ridge, 344. 

Bluffs, 78. 

Boats, 324, 325. 

Bohemia, 460. 

Bohemian Basin, 453. 

Bolivia, 499. 

Bombay, 503. 

"Bonanzas," 406. 

Borax, 350. 

Bordeaux, 441. 

Bosporus, 466, 467. 

Boston, 380. 

Boulder, glacial, 116. 

Boulder clay, 121. 

Boundaries, 332. 



INDEX 



529 



Bradford, 435. 

Brahmaputra plain, 501. 

Braided stream, roO. 

Brandy, 285. 

Brass, 301. 

Brazil, 497-499, 237, 286, 291. 

Brazilian province, 335, 497. 

Breadfruit, 276. 

Breakers, 152, 153. 

Bremen, 450. 

Brenner pass, 469, 475. 

Brick, 298. 

Bridges, 323. 

Brindrsi, 475. 

Bristol, 436. 

British Isles, 428-440. 

cities, 435, 436. 

coal fields, 434. 

colonies, 439, 440. 

economics, 434-440. 

people, 439, 440. 

physiography, 432-436. 

world power, 440. 
Brittany, 441, 442. 
Broken-block lands, 63, 64, 67, 349. 
Bronze, 301. 
Brooklyn, 382. 
Brussels, 447. 
Budapest, 462. 
Buenos Aires, 509. 
Buffalo (city), 386, 169, 370. 
Buffaloes, 279, 392, 410. 
Building stone, 298. 
Bulgaria, 465. 
Bunch grass, 238, 279, 392. 
Burro, 281. 

Bush, of Australia, 239. 
Bushmen, 411. 
Butte (city), 408. 
Buttes, 98. 

Cabinet woods, 335, 492, 493. 
Cactus, 228, 240. 
Calcutta, 502. 
Calendar, 17. 

Californian province, 336, 412-417. 
Californian type of climate, 225, 218. 
Calms, 190. 

Camels, 247, 281, 291, 321, 399, 409. 
Camphor, 307. 
Campos, 237. 

Canada, natural provinces and products. 
356-390, 513, 516-520. 

people of, 419-423. 

physiographic provinces, 341-343, 346- 
349, 352-355- 
Canadian province, 338, 516-519. 
Canadian type of climate, 225. 
Canals, 374-376, 444, 44". 449. 45i. 452, 
455> 483. 502. 

ship, 324, 374-376, 450, 451. 480, 494. 
Canals and fiords, 163. 



Canoe, birch-bark, 517. 

Canons, 86, 350. 

Canton, 484. 

Capacity for vapor, 193. 

Cape Cod, map, 129. 

Cape province, 336, 418. 

Cape Town, 418, 440. 

Carabao, 279. 

Carbon dioxide, 172, 173. 

Cardiff, 436. 

Caribbean province, 335, 493-496. 

Caribbean ranges, 351. 

Caribbean type of climate, 225. 

Caribou, 247, 516, 520, 521. 

Carnivorous animals, 247. 

Carpathian Mountains, 453, 457, 460. 

Cascade Range, 347. 

Cassava, 274. 

Catinga, 234. 

Catskill Mountains, 345. 

Cattle, 247,250, 278-279, 393-394, 399- 

in the United States, 393-394. 
Caucasian race, 258-262, 429. 
Caves, 134. 
Cedars, 199, 295. 
Celebes, 451. 
Celery, 270. 
Cement, 298. 

Central African province, 335, 506. 
Central America, 493, 494. 
Central Australian province, 336, 411. 
Central European province, 337, 427, 42J 

453-466. 
Central Lowland, 353. 
Cereal grains, 271-274, 399. 
Ceylon, 440. 

Channel of a stream, 77. 
Chapparal, 234. 
Chautauqua, Lake, 128. 
Cherbourg, 441. 
Chester, Pa., 371. 
Chestnut, 473, 477. 
Chicago, 388, 169, 370, 372, 373. 

water supply, 99. 
Chicle, 307. 

Chile, 418, 516, 218, 221. 
Chilean province, 336, 418. 
Chimney, volcanic, 64. 
Chimpanzee, 251, 252. 
China, 481-485, 220. 
Chinese people, 484. 
Chinese province, 337, 481-485. 
Chocolate, 286. 
Cinchona, 288, 504. 
Cincinnati, 390, 373. 
Circulating systems of the earth, 33. 
Cirque, 115. 
Cirrus clouds, 197. 
Cities, water supply, gg. 
Clay, 139, 143- 

constructive material, 297, 371. 
Clay soil, 143, 1 I 1 



53° 



INDEX 



Cleveland, 387, 169, 370. 

Cliffs, 130, 131. 

Climate (see Rainfall, Winds, etc.), 217-225. 

Alpine, 223. 

and civilization, 221. 

continental, 180, 219. 

east coast, 219. 

factors of, 217. 

Mediterranean, 218. 

oceanic, 151, 180, 220. 

of European^countries, 218-221, 425-427, 
433, 442, 448, 453, 457, 472, 477. 

of North America, 218-222, 354-357. 

of the United States, 218-220, 359, 391, 
400, 412, 415. 

types of, 223-225. 

west coast, 220. 

zones, 217-223. 
Climatic regions, 223-225. 

map, 224. 
Clothing, 289-292. 
"Cloud-bursts," 400. 
Clouds, 195-197. 
Clyde River, 168, 434. 
Coal, 312-314, 367-368, 390, 435. 
Coastal plains, 44. 

of North America, 354. 
Coast factors, 166. 
Coast Ranges, 347, 348. 
Coasts, 159-167. 

charts of, 159. 

classification of, 159. 

map of, 160, 161. 

rising, 162. 

sinking, 162. 
Cocoa, 285, 286. 
Coconut palm, 267, 335. 
Cod fishing, 515, 519. 
Coffee, 285-286, 497. 
Coke, 312, 368. 

Cold temperate provinces, 338. . 

Cold temperate zones, 181, 185. 

climate of, 222, 225. 
Cold wave, 204. 
Collective economy, 267. 
Colluvial soils, 140.' 
Cologne, 449. 
Colombia, 498, 499. 
Colorado Plateau, 350. 
Colorado River, 85, 86, 350, 404. 
Columbia Plateau, 349. 
Commerce, 320, 325, 326, 524-526. 

of Alaska, 515. 

of Argentina, 509. 

of the British Isles, 439, 440. 

of Canada, 379, 390. 

of China, 484. 

of France, 441, 445. 

of Germany, 449. 

of Holland, 451. 

of India, 502. 

of Italy, 474-475- 



Commerce, of Japan, 487, 488. 

of Mexico, 490, 491. 

of Spain, 478. 

of Sweden, 452. 

of Switzerland, 470. 

of the United States, 378-390, 415-417. 

of the world, 524-526. 
.Comstock lode, 406. 
Concrete, 298. 

Condensation of water vapor, 194, 195. 
Condiments, 284. 
Conglomerate, 37, 140. 
Conical projections, 21. 
Coniferous forests, 234-236. 
Constantinople, 466. 
Constantza, 463. 
Constructive materials, 294-304. 
Continental climate, 18c, 219, 425. 
Continental glacier, n 7-1 23. 
Continental islands, 31. 
Continental platform, 24, 25, 31. 
Continental shelf, 24, 25. 
Continents, 26-31. 
Contours, 39. 
Convection, 184. 
Copal, 307. 
Copenhagen, 452. 
Copper, 301, 369, 408. 
Coral, 157. 
Cordilleras, 346. 
Cork (city), 439. 
Cork oak, 296, 477. 
Corn, 271, 272, 360-362, 489. 
Corn-swine-cattle system, 361. 
Corsica, 467. 

Cotton, 289, 359, 365-366. 
Craigs, 434. 
Crater, 64. 
Crater Lake, 127. 
Crefeld, 449. 
Creusot, 443. 
Cripple Creek, 407. 
Croats, 429, 465. 
Crystalline rock, 38. 
Cuba, 495, 493. 
Cumberland Mountains, 345. 
Cumulus clouds, 197. 
Currants, 480. 

Currents, ocean (see Ocean currents). 
Cut-off, no. 
Cyclones, 189, 201. 

effect on climate, 219. 

effect on rainfall, 201. 

procession of, 199. 

tornadoes, 207, 208. 
Cylindrical projection, 20. 
Czechoslovakia, 460, 461, 
Czechs, 460, 461, 429. 

Dairy countries, 279. 

Dalmatia, 477. 

Danube River, 453, 460-465. 



INDEX 



531 



Danzig, 458. 

Dardanelles, 467. 

Date palm, 276, 405, 409, 413, 478. 

Day, 10, 14, 15. 

civil and solar, 15. 
Death Valley, 350. 
Degradation defined, 72. 
Dekkan, 501-503, 54, 233. 
Dekkan province, 335, 501-503. 
Delhi, 503. 
Delta, 49, 83, 166. 
Delta ports, 168. 
Denmark, 428, 452. 
Density of air, 184. 
Density of population, map, 261. 
Density of sea water, 152. 
Deposition, 80-83. 
Derwentwater, 125. 
Deserts, 213, 216, 218, 229, 239-242. 
Detroit, 387. 
Dew, 194, 198. 
Dew point, 194. 
Diamonds, 510. 
Dikes, 83, 450. 
Dinaric Alps, 464. 
Diseases, 256. 
Dissected plateau, 58. 
Distributaries, 83. 
Divide, 77. 
Dobrudja, 465. 
Dogs, 282, 321, 505, 522. 
Dolphin, 245. 

Domestic animals, 270, 277-284, 310, 321. 
Donkey, 281. 
Drainage, 95. 
Dresden, 449. 

Drift, glacial, 116, 119-1 23. 
Drouth plants, 228. 
Drowned valleys, 103, 162, 433. 
Drumlins, 121. 
Dry-farming, 398. 
Ducks, 283. 
Dunes, 136-138. 
Durham, N. C., 374. 
Dust, 138, 174. 
Dutch people, 451, 452. 
DyestufFs, 307. 

Earth, 9. 

as an organism, 32-35. 

axis of, 11, 13, 14, 32. 

distribution of light and heat, 175. 

plan of the, 24-31, 34. 

revolution, 11-13, 32. 

rotation, 10, 15, 33. 

structure, 9, 33. 

temperature of, 32, 34. 
Earth crust, 24. 

economic relations of, 39. 

structure of, 36. 
Earthquakes, 67-69. 

economic relations of, 69. 



Earthquakes, map of earthquake areas, 

East coast climates, 219. 

Eastern and western hemispheres, 27. 

East Indies, Dutch, 451, 504. 

East Prussia, 458. 

East Slavs, 429. 

Ebb tide, 153. 

Economic geography, defined, 265. 

Economic relations, of earthquakes, 69. 

of erosion, 95-98. 

of fiord coasts, 164. 

of glacial drift, 122. 

of gradation, 90. 

of ground water, 134. 

of lakes, 128. 

of mountains, 58. 

of plains, 52. 

of plateaus, 53. 

of rock, 39. 

of the sea, 157. 

of standing water, 131. 

of streams, 95-1 1 1 . 

of sun, 14. 

of volcanoes, 67. 

of waterfalls, 94. 

of winds, 192. 

of theworld, 32-35, 333. 
Economies, human, map of, 268. 
Ecuador, 499. 
Edinburgh, 434. 
Egypt, 409, 148. 
Elba, 472, 473. 
Elbe River, 449, 450. 
Electricity, 316. 
Electric railways, 378. 
Elephants, 247, 248, 252, 282. 
Elevator, grain, 363. 
Emu, 253. 

Eolian plains, 49, 52, 53. 
Eolian soils, 143. 
Equatorial calms, 190. 
Equatorial currents, 156. 
Equatorial zone, 181, 185. 

climate of, 217, 225. 
Equinox, 14. 
Erie Canal, 375. 
Erosion, 76, 81, 84, 86, 87. 

by wind, 136. 

economic relations of, 95-98. 

effect of, 88-90. 

hills of, 59. 

rapidity of, go. 
Eskers, 121. 
Eskimos, 520-523. 
Essen, 449. 
Essential oils, 307. 
Esthonia, 459. 
Esths, 429. 
Estuaries, 162. 
Etna, Mt., 472. 
Eurasia, 27. 
Eurasian Arctic province, 339, 520. 



532 



INDEX 



Eurasian Interior province, 337, 398. 
Europe, 26, 27, 28. 

coast of, 166, 167. 

glaciation of, 123. 

natural provinces, countries, and prod- 
ucts, 426-480, 515, 520. 

people (see names of countries), 427-429. 

physiographic provinces of, 425. 
Evaporation, 193. 
Everest, Mt., 24. 
Everglades, 366. 
Explosives, 315. 

Factories, 318, 319. 

Fairbanks, 518. 

Fall Line, 355, 374, 105. 

Fall River, 371. 

Faulting, 63, 69. 

Faults, defined, 63. 

Fertilizers, 146, 304, 372, 448. 

Field culture, 270. 

Film water, 147. 

Finger Lakes, 126. 

Finland, 458. 

Finns, 429. 

Fiord harbors, 168. 

Fiords, 163, 164, 165. 

Fire, use by man, 308. 

Fish, 243-245, 100, 157. 

Fishing, 267, 269. 

in Alaska, 514. 

in Japan, 486. 

in Newfoundland, 519. 

in Norway, 515. 

salmon, 413, 514. 

sturgeon, 455. 
Fiume, 465, 477. 
Flax, 290, 2gi. 
Flemings, 429, 446. 

Flint, 299. - 

Flood plain, 49, 77, 78. 
Floods, 103, 104, no. 
Florence, 476. 
Florida, structure, 355. 
Floridan province, 337, 356-390. 

agriculture in, 360-366. 

importance of, 357. 

mining in, 367-370. 
Floridan type of climate, 225. 
Flow of tides, 153. 
Fog, 195. 

Food supply of man, 266. 
Forests, conservation of, 297. 

kinds of, 229-236. 
Formosa, 486. 
Fossils, 96. 
Fowl, 283. 
France, 428, 440-446. 

colonies, 446. 

commerce, 446. 

industries, 442-445. 

people, 428, 445. 



France, physiography, 441. 
Frost, 198. 
Fruits, 275, 276. 

Californian, 413. 

Floridan, 366. 

Mississippian, 364. 

tropical, 442, 473, 478, 486, 493. 
Fuel, 311-315. 
Furs, 291, 292. 

Galatz, 463. 
Galveston, 386, 168. 
Galveston hurricane, 207. 
Ganges plain, 501. 
Garden culture, 269. 
Gary, 370. 
Gasoline, 315. 
Gauchos, 509. 
Geese, 283. 

Genesee River falls, 101. 
Geneva, 471. 
Genoa, 474, 169. 
Geography, defined, 35. 
Germany, 428, 447-450. 

cities, 450. 

industries, 448-449. 

people, 428, 450. 

physiography, 447-448. 
Geysers, 133. 
Ghats, 50T. 
Gibraltar, 467. 
Ginger, 495. 

Giraffe, 247, 248, 251, 252. 
Glacial drift, 116, 119-123. 

economic relations of, 122. 
Glacial lakes, 125, 126. 
Glacial map of United States and Canada, 

120. 
Glacial plains, 49, 53. 
Glacial soils, 142. 
Glaciers, n 2-1 23. 

Alpine, 113. 

continental, 117-123. 

valley, 113. 
Glasgow, 434, 99, 168. 
Glass, 299. 

Globular projection, 19. 
Gloversville, N. Y., 372. 
Gneiss, 38, 139. 
Goats, 280, 247, 250, 2gi. 
Gold, 302-303, 405-407, 414, 510, 518. 
Gorge, 86. 
Gradation, 72. 

by ground water, 132-135. 

by ice, n 3-1 23. 

by running water, 72-94. 

by standing water, 128. 

by winds, 135-138. 

economic relations of, 90. 
Grains, 271-274. 
Grand Canon, 85, 86, 98. 
Grand Rapids, Mich., 373. 



INDEX 



533 



Granite, 38, 139. 

as building stone, 299. 
Grape, 276. 

Grassland, 229, 236-239. 
Gravel, 143. 
Gravity, 33. 
Greasewood, 392. 
Great American Desert, 394, 397.. 
Great Basin, 349. 
Great Britain, 428-440, 313. 
Great Lakes, 103, 125. 
Great Plains, 53, 54, 352, 301. 
Great Salt Lake, 350. 
Greater Antilles, 493, 495. 
Greece, 466, 479, 480. 
Greek Catholics, 429. 
Green corn, 361. 

Greenland, 29, 117, 164, 223, 520. 
Greenland plateau, 342. 
Greenland province, 339, 520-523. 
Grenoble, 443. 
Ground, denned, 36. 
Ground sea, 132. 
Ground water, 132. 

economic relations of, 134. 

gradation by, 132-135. 
Guanaco, 282. 
Guano, 304. 
Guiana, 498. 
Guinea fowl, 283. 
Gulf Stream, 156. 
Gullying, 84, 148. 
Gums, 307. 

Hachured maps, 40. 
Hailstones, 198. 
Haiti, 495. 
Halifax, 440, 380. 
Hamburg, 450, 169. 
Hanging valleys, 116. 
Harbors, 167-171. 

artificial, 169. 
Havana, 495. 
Havre, 441. 
Hawaiian Islands, 504. 
Heat (see Temperature) . 
Heat, earth's, as source of power, 317. 
Heat, use by man, 308. 
Heat belts, 177. 
Heat equator, 212. 
Heat from sun, 32, 34. 

distribution of, 175. 
Hedjaz, 410. 
Hemlock Lake, 126. 
Hemp, 337, 454. 
Herbivorous animals, 247. 
Herding, 277. 

in the Alps, 470. 

in Argentina and Uruguay, 509. 

in Australia, 418, 511, 512. 

in Caribbean lands, 493. 

in France, 442. 



Herding, in the llanos, 498. 

in Russia, 454. 

in Turkestan, 399. 

in the United States, 360, 393-394, 402, 
413- 
Hides, 336, 399, 454, 507, 509. 
Highlands, defined, 53. 
Highs, 204. 
Hills, 59. 
Hinterland, 384. 
Hippopotamus, 247, 248, 252. 
Hoang River, 481, 104. 
Hoe culture, 269. 
Hog, 247, 281. 
Hohe Tauern, 469. 
Holland, 450-452. 

people of, 452. 
Hollows, defined, 63. 
Hongkong, 440, 484. 
Hook, 129. 

Hops, 436, 442, 448, 460. 
Horses, 247, 250, 280, 310, 399. 
Horseshoe lake, no. 
Hot springs, 133. 
Houses, 2g2, 293, 399, 401, 402. 
Hudson River, 170, 375. 
Hull, 436. 

Human economies, map, 268. 
Human life (see Man), 35, 333. 
Human species, 255-262. 
Humidity, 193. 
Humus, 36, 144. 
Hungarian Basin, 453, 462. 
Hungary, 459, 462. 
Hunting, 267, 269. 
Hurricanes, 207. 
Hydrosphere, 9. 

Doerian Peninsula, 477-479. 

Ice, gradation by, 113-123. 

Icebergs, 115, 520. 

Ice caps, 117. 

Ice deserts, 242. 

Iceland, 164. 

Ice sheets, 117-123. 

Igloo, 293, 522. 

Igneous rock, 38. 

soils from, 139. 
Imperial Valley, 404. 
India, 148, 501-504. 

people of, 502. 
Indianapolis, 372, 378. 
Indian Ocean, 151. 
Indians (Americans), 257, 259-267. 

in Canada, 516, 517. 

in Mexico, 489, 492, 493. 

in South America, 3gg, 499. 

in the. United States, 359, 393, 401. 
Indigo, 307, 504. 

Indo-African realm of animals, 251. 
Indo-China, 503. 
Indo-Chinese province, 335. 



534 



INDEX 



Insects, 245. 246. 

domesticated, 283, 284. 
Insolation, 266. 
Intemperate climate, 181, 225. 
Interior plain of Europe, 425. 
Interior plains of North America, 352-353. 
Interior provinces, 338, 391-399, 405-409. 
Interior type of climate, 225. 
Intermediate plants, 228. 
Intermont Plateaus, 348. 
Intermont valley, 62. 
International date line, 16. 
Intertropical provinces, 335. 
Ireland, 439. 

Iron, 299-301, 369-370, 435, 448. 
Irrigation, 102, 104, 148,402, 405. 
Islands, 31. 

life on, 254. 
Isobars, 184. 

maps, 186, 187. 
Isotherms, 177. 

maps, 176, 178, 179. 
Istria, 477. 
Italy, 428, 471-476. 

industries, 473-475. 

irrigation, 473, 148. 

people, 476, 419-420. 

physiography, 471, 472. 
Ivory, 335, 506. 

Jackson, Mich., 373. 
Jamaica, 440, 495. 
Japan, 485-488, 220. 
Japanese people, 488. 
Java, 451, 504. 
Jetties, 168. 
Jews, 429. 
Joliet, 370. 
Jugoslavia, 465. 
Juneau, 513. 
Jura, 470. 
Jute, 502. 

Kalahari desert, 52, 410. 

Kalahari province, 336, 410. 

Karnes, 121. 

Kangaroo, 253, 254. 

Kansas City, 3go, 372. 

Karlsbad, 460. 

Kayak, 521. 

Kerosene, 315. 

Key West, 374, 377. 

Khirghiz, 399. 

Kief, 459. 

Kiel, 449, 450. 

Kimberley, 510. 

Klondike gold field, 518. 

Knots, mountain, 58, 343. 

Kobe, 487. 

Kongo province, 335, 505. 

Kopjes, 410. 

Koi'ea, 481, 486, 488, 220. 



Krupp steel works, 449. 
Kyoto, 488. 

Labor supply, 310. 

Lac, 307. 

Lacustrine plain, 49. 

Lagoon, 129, 130. 

Lagoon harbors, 168. 

Lake district of England, 435. 

Lake plains, 49. 

Lake ports, 169. 

Lakes, 124-128. 

Alpine, 126. 

economic relations of, 128. 

effects on a river, 103. 

glacial, 118, 125, 126. 

horseshoe, no. 

life history of, 127, f28. 

navigation of, 103. 

volcanic, 127. 
Land (see Continents, Islands, Gradation, 
etc.), 36-72. 

height of, 22, 24, 28-31. 

variations of area, 24-25. 
Land and water hemispheres, 25-26. 
Land forms, 41. 

Land masses, arrangement of, 26. 
Landslide, 75. 
Languages of Europe, 429. 
Lapps, 520. 
Laterite, 145. 
Latitude, 10, n. 
Laurentian lakes, 125. 
Laurentian peneplain, 45, 119, 341. 
Lauterbrunnen, 114. 
Lava, 38, 64. 
Lava soils, 140. 
Lead, 301. 
Leadville, 407. 
Leather, 292. 
Leeds, 435. 
Leicester, 435. 
Lemons, 276, 366, 413, 473. 
Lesser Antilles, 493, 496. 
Letts, 429. 
Letvia, 459. 
Levant, 468. 
Levees, no, in, 473. 
Life, human (see Man), 35, ^33- 
Life on the earth (see Plants, Animals, Man), 

33, 34, 35, 333- 
Light, artificial, 309. 
Light from sun, distribution of, 175. 
Lignite, 312. 
Lille, 443. 
Limestone, 37. 

as building stone, 2gg. 
Limestone soils, 140. 
Limoges, 443. 
Linen, 290. 
Linseed oil, 291. 
Lion, 247, 248. 



INDEX 



535 



Lisbon, 478. 
Lithosphere, 9. 
Lithuania, 459. 
Liverpool, 435. 

water supply, gg. 
Llama, 252, 282, 4gg. 
Llanos, 237, 4g8. 
Loaded stream, 7g. 
Loams, 144. 
Lochs, 434. 
Lodz, 458. 
Loess soils, 144. 
Lofoden Islands, 515. 
London, 436-438, i6g. 

water supply, gg. 
Longitude, 10, 11, 16. 
"Long trail," 3Q3. 
Los Angeles, 417. 

water supply, gg. 
Lotschberg tunnel, 46g. 
Louisville, 374. 
Lowlands, 41-53. 
Lows, 204. 
Lugano, Lake, 126. 
Lumber, 2g4. 
Lumbering, 2g6. 

in Canada, 517. 

in Germany, 448. 

on Pacific coast, 413. 
Lyons, 443. 
Lyttleton, 512. 

Macaroni, 473. 
Macedonia, 466. 
Mackenzie plain, 352. 
Mackenzie River, 352. 
McKinley, Mt., 347. 
Madagascar province, 335, 507. 
Madras, 503. 
Madrid, 47g. 
Magyars, 462, 42g. 
Mahogany, 2g6. 
Maine coast, map, 165. 
Maize (see Corn), 272. 
Malaga, 478, 47g. 
Malay province, 335, 504. 
Malta, 440. 
Mammals, 247. 
Man, 255-262. 

as an animal, 255. 

enemies of, 256. 

food supply of, 266. 

influence of environment, as- 

life, 35, 333- 

varieties and races, 256-262. 
Man power, 3og, 321. 
Manchester, 435, i6g. 

water supply, gg. 
Manchuria, 483, 488, 220. 
Manchurian province, 337, 481- 
Mango, 276. 
Manioc, 260, 274, 500. 



Mantle rock, denned, 36. 

formation of, 72. 

movement of, 74-76. 

transportation of, 78. 
Manufacture, 318-320. 

conditions of, 318. 

in the British Isles, 434, 435, 43g, 440. 

in China, 483, 485. 

in France, 443. 

in Germany, 44g. 

in Italy, 473. 

in Japan, 487. 

in Mexico, 4go. 

in Norway, 515. 

in Russia, 454-455. 

in Switzerland, 471. 

in the United States, 370-374, 382. 
Manzanillo, 40 1. 
Maoris, 512. 
Map projections, 18-21. 
Maps, 18-21. 

contoured, 39. 

list of, 543. 

natural, 331. 

relief, 39. 
Map scales, 21. 
Marble, 2gg. 
Marine animals, 243. 
Marl, 128. 

Marmora, Sea of, 467. 
, Marseilles, 441, i6g. 
Marshes, gs, 124-128. 
Mate, 285, 286. 
Mature drainage, 95. 
Maturely dissected land, 88. 
Maturity of streams and valleys, 88, 91. 
Mauritius, 440. 
Medicines, 287-288. 
Mediterranean climate, 218, 426, 468. 
Mediterranean province, 336, 427, 428, 467- 

480. 
Mediterranean region, 425. 
Mediterranean Sea, 166, 467. 
Mediterranean type of white race, 260, 429. 
Melbourne, 511. 
Melons, 366, 402, 411. 
Mercator's projection, 20. 
Mercury, 302. 
Meridians, 10, 11. 
Mesopotamia, 410. 
Messina, Strait of, 471. 
Metals, 2gg-303. 

used in electric batteries, 317. 
Metamorphic rock, 38. 
Mexican plateau, 351. 
Mexican province, 335, 48g~4g3- 
Mexican type of climate, 225. 
Mexico, 48g-4g3, 54, 223. 
Mexico (city), 491. 
Migration, of animals, 249. 

of man, 256. 
Milan, 475- 



536 



INDEX 



Mind sphere, 256. 

Mineral springs, 133. 

Mining, 294, 209-303, 312-314. 

economy, 294, 408, 

of coal, 312-314, 368. 

of copper, 301, 408. 

of gold, 302-303, 405-407, 411, 510, sit 

of iron, 300, 369-370. 

of silver, 303, 405-407. 
Minneapolis, 389, 363, 372. 
Mississippi River, 105-111, 353. 

delta, 82, 168, 355. 
Mississippian province, 337, 356-390. 

agriculture in, 360-366. 

cities, 370-390. 

importance of, 357. 

mining in, 367-370. 
Mississippian type of climate, 225, 355. 
Missouri River, 106. 
Mitchell, Mt., 345. 
Mohammedans, 429. 
Mohawk gap, 375. 
Moline, 111., 373. 
Mollweide's projection, 20. 
Moluccas, 451. 

Mongolian race, 257, 259, 429. 
Monkeys, 252, 253. 
Monsoon forests, 231. 
Monsoons, 192. 
Mont Cenis tunnel, 469. 
Montenegro, 465. 
Monterey, 490. 
Montevideo, 509. 
Months, 18. 

Mont Pelee, eruption, 67. 
Montreal, 379. 
Moon, 17. 

cause of tides, 154, 155. 
Moose, 516. 
Moraines, marginal, 121. 

terminal, 116, 119, 121. 
Morava-Vardar valley, 464. 
Moravia, 460. 
Moravians, 429. 
Mormons, 394, 403. 
Moscow, 455, 456. 
Mountains, 54-59. 

age of, 90, 91. 

economic, relations of, 58. 
Mountain system, 54. 
Muck soils, 144. 
Mulberry, 283. 
Mules, 281. 
Munich, 448. 
Muskegs, 118. 
Musk ox, 250, 520, 516. 
Mustard, 284. 

Nagasaki, 487. 
Nancy, 443. 
Nantes, 441. 
Naples, 472, 475, 169. 



Narcotics, 285. 
Natural gas, 315, 368, 390. 
Natural map, 331. 
Natural provinces, 328-339. 

maps, 328-329, 358, 430-431, 482. 
Natural resources, 263-266, 326. 

utilization of, 265. 
Neap tide, 155. 
Netherlands, 428, 450-452. 
New England, manufactures, 370. 
New England plateau, 343. 
New England, water power, 371. 
Newfoundland, 343, 344. 
New Guinea, 30, 504. 
New Orleans, 386, 168, 374. 

water supply, qq. 
New World, 27. 
New York, 381-384, 170, 372. 

map, 171. 

water supply, 99. 
New Zealand, 511-512, 164, 221. 
New Zealand province, 337, 511-512. 
Niagara River, 92, 93, 94, 128. 
Nickel, 342. 
Night, 10, 14, 15. 
Nile River, 409, 104. 
Nimbus clouds, 197. 
Nitrate, 304. 
Nitrogen, 172, 173. 

sources of, 304. 
Nomadic life, 278. 
Nome, 349, 518. 
North America, 26, 27, 29. 

climates of, 218-222, 354-357. 

coast of, 163-167. 

future use of land, 422. 

glaciation of, 11 7-1 23. 

natural provinces, countries, and products, 
356-423. 489-496, 513-523- 

physiographic provinces, 341-355- 

resources, 341. 
Northern and southern continents, 27. 
Northern realm of animals, 250. 
Norway, 515, 164. 
Norwegian province, 338, 515. 
Nottingham, 435. 
Nunatak Glacier, 115. 

Oaks, 295, 296. 
Oasis, 240, 241. 
Oats, 271, 273, 364. 
Ocean currents, 156, 157. 

effect on climate, 156, 157. 

effect on isotherms, 177. 

map of, 160, 161. 
Oceanic basin, 24, 25. 
Oceanic climate, 151, 180, 220. 
Oceanic islands, 31, 66. 
Oceans (see Sea). 

depth, 150. 

form, 150. 

temperature, 151, 156, 160, 161. 



INDEX 



537 



Odessa, 45s, 456, 459. 

Ohio River, 107, 108, 353. 

Oils, 306, 307. 

Old Faithful geyser, 133. 

Old World, 27. 

Olive, 276, 442, 473. 

Omaha, 372. 

Onions, 270. 

Opium, 286, 287. 

Oporto, 478. 

Orange Free State, 509, 510. 

Oranges, 276, 366, 413, 442, 473, 493. 

Oregon province, 337, 412-417. 

Oregon trail, 394,. 395- 

Oregon type of climate, 225, 220. 

Ores, 299. 

Orinoco province, 335, 498.' 

Orizaba, 352. 

Orthographic projection, 19. 

Osaka, 487, 488. 

Ostriches, 252, 283; 510. 

Outcrop, defined, 37. 

Oxygen, 172, 173. 

Ozark plateau, 345-346, 370. 

Pacific Ocean, (see Sea), 150, 159. 

coast, 163-165. 
Pacific ranges of North America, 347. 
Pack animals, 321. 
Palermo, 476. 
Palestine, 410. 
Palms, food supply, 267. 
Palouse country, 142. 
Pampas, 239, 508. 
Panama Canal, 494, 158. 
Papagos, 401. 
Paper, 297. 
Para, 500. 
Parallels, 10, 11. 
Paris, 445. 

Patagonian province, 337, 399. 
Peaches, 276, 364, 366. 
Peafowl, 283. 
Pearls, 335. 
Pears, 276, 364. 
Peat, 312. 
Peat soils, 144. 
Peneplain, 45, 88, 90. 
Penguin, 245. 
Pennine Range, 434. 
Perth, 418. 
Peru, 411, 499, 54. 
Peruvian province, 336, 411. 
Petersburg, 374. 
Petrograd, 454, 455, 456. 
Petroleum, 314, 315, 368, 454, 490. 
Philadelphia, 384, 371, 372. 
Philippines, 504, 24. 
Phosphorus, sources of, 305. 
Physiographic provinces, 69. 

maps, 70, 71, 340, 424. 

of Europe, 424. 



Physiographic provinces of North America. 

341-355- 
Physiographic regions, Brit. Is., 432,434-436. 
Piedmont alluvial plain, 81 . 
Piedmont Plateau, 345, 354. 
Pigeons, 283. 
Pigments, 306. 
Pikes Peak, 73, 346. 
Pimento, 495. 
Pine, 294. 
Pipe, volcanic, 64. 
Pittsburgh, 389, 370. 
Plains, 41-53. 

alluvial, 45, 47"49, 53. 81-83. 

coastal, 44. 

economic relations of, 52. 

eolian, 4g, 52, 53. 

flood, 49. 

glacial, 49, 53. 

lacustrine or lake, 49. 

of accumulation or aggradation, 49, 52, 53 

of degradation, 45. 

peneplain, 45, 88, 90. 

structural, 44. 

wind-worn, 52 ; worn-down, 44, 53. 
Planet Deep, 24. 
Plantain, 276, 505. 
Plantation culture, 270. 
Plant regions, 228-242. 

map, 230. 
Plants, 226-242. 

absorb carbon dioxide, 173. 

adaptation of, 226-228. 

as soil makers, 146. 

conditions of life, 33-35, 226. 

distribution of, 226-242. 

domestication of, 269. 

drouth plants, 228. 

effect of day and night, 14, 15. 

intermediate plants, 228. 

relation to man, 265. 

relation to temperature, 227. 

relation to water, 227, 228. 

salt plants, 228. 

water plants, 227. 
Plata province, 337, 508. 
Plateaus, 53. — 

dissected, 58. 

economic relations of, 53. 
Platinum, 519, 454. 
Playfair's law, 88. 
Poland, 457-458. 
Polar bear, 520, 521. 
Polar caps, 181, 185. 

climate of, 222, 225. 
Polar deserts, 240. 
Polar type of climate, 225. 
Polders. 450. 
Poles, 429, 457-458. 
Ponds, 124-128. 
Po plain, 471, 474, 475. 
Population of the world, 262. 



538 



INDEX 



Population of the world, map, 261. 

Porterage, 321. 

Portland, Ore., 417. 

Porto Rico, 495. 

Ports, 167-171. 

Portsmouth, Eng., 436. 

Portugal, 428, 478, 479. 

Potash, sources of, 305, 445. 

Potatoes, 274. 

Pottery, 303. 

Poultry, 283. 

Power, use by man, 309-317. 

Prague, 461. 

Prairies, 220, 237. 

Prairie schooner, 395. 

Precipitation, 197, 209-216. 

Pressure of air, 181, 184, 188. 

distribution of, 188. 
Projections, map, 18-21. 
Protestants, 429. 
Prussia, 450. 
Psychosphere, 256. 
Pueblos, 401-402. 
Puget Sound, 348, 417. 
Pulque, 285. 
Puys, 441. 
Pyrenees, 477. 

Quartz, 299. 

Queensland province, 337, 510. 

Queenstown, 439. 

Quinine, 288, 504. 

Races of men, 256-260, 262, 429. 

Racine, Wis., 373. 

Radium, 317. 

Railroads (see Transportation), 324, 524. 

in Russia, 455. 

in the Alps, 469. 

in the United States, 376-378, 396. • 
Rainfall, 209-216. 

laws of, 212-216. 

maps, 210-211, 214, 215. 
Rain gauge, 198. 
Ranches, 279, 394, 508. 
Rand, the, 510. 
Range of temperature, 180. 

map, 182. 
Ravine, 86. 
Reclamation Service of the United States, 

405, 404- 
Redwood, 294. 
Reefs, 157. 
Reindeer, 282, 520. 
Relative humidity, 193. 
Relief, defined, 41. 

principal features of, 31. 
Relief map of the world, 22, 23. 
Relief maps, 39. 
Religions of Europe, 429. 
Residual soil, 139. 
Resins, 307. 



Revived streams, 90. 

Revolution, of earth, n-13, 32. 

Rhine River, 445, 449-450, 103. 

Rhone valley, 467. 

Rice, 271, 273, 366. 

Richmond, 374. 

Rift valley lowland of the British Isles, 

434- 
Rift valleys, 64, 124. 
Riga, 459. 
River ports, 168. 
Rivers (see Streams). 
Roads, 322, 378. 
Rock, 36-30- 

disintegration of, 72. 

economic relations of, 39. 

products of disintegration, 139, 140. 
Rockford, 111., 373. 
Rock sphere, 9. 

Rock waste (see Mantle rock), 72. 
Rocky Mountains, 346. 
Rodents, 247, 248. 
Roman Catholics, 429. 
Romanic Languages, 429. 
Rome, 475-476. 
Root crops, 274. 
Rotation, earth's, 10, 15, S3- 
Rotterdam, 451. 
Rouen, 443. 
Roumania, 462-464. 
Roumanian basin, 453. 
Round inlets, 169. 
Royal Gorge, Colorado, 86. 
Rubber, 291. 
Rum, 285. 
Run-off, 77. 
Russia, 428, 453-457- 

industries, 454-455. 

people, 428, 456. 
Russia, Asiatic, 456. 
Russians, Little, 459, 461, 429. 
Ruthenians, 461, 429. 
Rye, 271, 273, 364. 

Sagebrush, 392. 

Sago, 335, 486. 

Sahara, 30, 468. 

Saharan province, 336, 409. 

St. Etienne, 443^ 

St. Gothard, 468, 469. 

St. Joseph, 372. 

St. Lawrence River, 100, 103, 128, 374, 380. 

St. Louis, 389, 372, 373. 

water supply, 99. 
St. Nazaire, 441 . 
St. Paul, 389. 
St. Pierre, destroyed, 67. 
Sake, 285. 
Salmon, 413, 514. 
Salonica, Gulf of, 464. 
Salt, 305, 306. 
Salt Lake trail, 394, 395. 



INDEX 



539 



Salt plants, 228. 
Salt River valley, 403, 404. 
Salton Sink, 350, 404. 
Sand, 143. 

erosion by, 136. 
Sandstone, 37, 140. 

as building stone, 299. 
San Francisco, 416. 
Santa Fe trail, 395. 
Santiago, 418. 
Santos, 498. 
Sao Paulo, 498. 
Sardines, 442. 
Sardinia, 467, 472, 473. 
Sarre basin, 445. 
Saturation, 193. 
Savannah River, 104, 105. . 
Savannas, 217, 236-239. 
Saxony, 449, 450. 
Scandinavian highland, 425. 
Schenectady, N. Y., 371. 
Scotch Highlands, 434. 
Scotland, 515, 434, 164. 
Screes, defined, 75. 
Scrub, 234. 

Sea (see Oceans, Standing water, Waves), 
150-159. 

depth of, 22, 24, 1 50-15 1. 

economic relations of, 157. 

influence on man, 158. 

life in, 243-245. 

navigation of, 158. 

tides in, 153-155- 
Sea cliffs, 130. 
Sea water,' composition, 151. 

density of, 152. 

pressure of, 152. 

temperature, 151, 160, 161. 
Seal, 245, 248, 521, 522, 523. 
Seasons, n-15, 18, 32, $$. 
Seattle, 417. 
Sedentary soils, 139. 
Sediment, 76, 78-83. 

carried by air, 135, 136. 

glacial, 116. 
Sedimentary rocks, 37. 
Semmering Pass, 469. 
Serb-Croat-Slovene State, 465. 
Serbia, 465. 
Seville, 479. 
Sevres, 443. 
Shale, 37, 140. 
Shanghai, 484. 
Shasta, Mt., 65, 347, 415. 
Sheboygan, Wis., 373. 
Sheep, 247, 250, 279, 291, 394, 509, 511. 
Sheffield, 435. 
Shelter, for man, 292. 
Ships, 324, 325. 
Siam, 504. 
Siberia, 456. 
Siberian province, 338, 519. 



Siberian railway, 455. 

Sicily, 472, 473. 

Sierra Madre, 347, 351. 

Sierra Nevada, 64, 347, 415, 

Silesia, 460. 

Silk, 291, 443, 473, 483, 486. 

Silkworm, 283, 284, 291. 

Silt, 143. 

Silver, 302, 303, 405-407. 

Simplon tunnel, 469. 

Singapore, 440, 169. 

Sirocco, 472. 

Sisal, 492. 

Skerries, 131. 

Slate, 343. 

Slavic languages, 429. 

Slavs, 429. 

Slovaks, 460, 461, 429. 

Slovenes, 429. 

Smyrna, 480. 

Snake River, 349. 

Snowflakes, 197. 

Snowshoes, 517. 

Soap, 307. 

Soda, 350, 372. 

Sofia, 465. 

Soils, 139-149. 

alluvial, 142. 

and population, 149. 

chemical constituents of, 145. 

colluvial, 140. 

composition of, 143. 

conservation of, 148. 

defined, 36, 139. 

derived from mountains, 59. 

derived from volcanoes, 67. 

eolian, 143. 

from igneous rocks, 139. 

glacial, 122, 142. 

lava, 140. 

limestone, 140. 

made by plants, 146. 

map, 141. 

result of transportation, 76. 

sedentary, 139. 

temperature of, 146. 

transported, 140. 

tropical, 144. 

types of, 144. 
Soil wash, 95." 
Soil water, 147. 
Solstice, 14. 
Sonora Desert, 351. 
Soo Canals, 374, 375. 
South Africa, 218, 239, 410, 418. 
South African province, 337, 509. 
South America, 26, 27, 29. 

coasts of, 162, 163, 167. 

provinces, countries, and products, 399, 
411, 418, 497-500, 516. 
South American realm of animals, 252. 
Southampton, 436. 



540 



INDEX 



South Bend, Ind., 373. 

Southeast lowland of England, 436. 

Southern Ocean, 150. 

Southern uplands of the British Isles, 434. 

South Slavs,, 465, 429. 

Southwest American province, 338, 516. 

Southwest Australia, 218. 

Southwest Australian province, 336, 418. 

Spain, 428, 477-479. 

Sphinx, eroded, 73. 

Spices, 284, 452, 506. 

Spit, 129. 

Springfield, O., 373. 

Springs, mineral, 133. 

Spring tide, 155. 

Spruce, 235, 295. 

Stacks, 131. 

Standard time, 16. 

Standing water, 124-131. 

economic relations of, 131. 

gradation by, 128. 
Steam engine, 311. 
Steel, 300. 

Steppes, 54, 237, 238. 
Stereographic projection, 19. 
Stettin, 449. 
Stimulants, 285. 
Stockholm, 452. 
Stone, building, 298. 
Storms, 198, 207-209. 
Strata, defined, 37. 
Stratus clouds, 197. 
Streams, age of, 88. 

and relief, 88. 

braided, 106. 

course of, 76-78, 86-88. 

crookedness of, 83, 84, no. 

economic relations of, 95-1 n. 

effect of lakes on, 103. 

floods in, 103, 104, no. 

loaded, 79. 

navigation of, 103, 106-111. 

relation of valleys to, 88. 

revived, 90. 

routes of travel and transportation, 100. 

scenery, 98. 

source of food supply, 100. 

source of water supply, 99. 

sources of, 77. 

speed of, 79. 

transportation of mantle rock, 76, 78- 

. 8 3- 

utilization of, 1 03-11 1. 

water power of, 101. 
Stream system, 77, 78. 
Structural plains, 44. 
Sturgeon, 455. 
Substratum, 265, 266. 
Subtropical and warm temperate provinces, 

336- 
Subtropical zones, 181, 185. 

climate of, 218, 225. 



Sudan, 410. 

Suez, 440. 

Suez Canal, 159, 324. 

Sugar beets, 274, 405, 446, 448. 

Sugar cane, 275. 

Sulina, 463. 

Sulphur, 306. 

Sumatra, 451. 

Sun, 10-14, 34. 

as direct source of power, 317 

cause of tides, 155. 

economic relations, 14. 

energy from, 309. 
Superior district, 369. 
Swansea, 436. 
Sweden, 452, 519. 
Sweet potato, 274, 493. 
Swine, 247, 281. 
Switzerland, 428, 470-471. 

industries, 470. 

people, 471. 
Sydney, 511. 
Syria, 410. 

Tacoma, 417. 

Taghanic Falls, 98. 

Talus, defined, 75. 

Tampa, 374. 

Tampico, 490, 491. 

Tapioca, 274. 

Tapir, 252, 253. 

Taro, 274. 

Tasmania, 30, 512. 

Tatars, 429. 

Tea, 285, 286. 

Technical materials, 304-307. 

Tehuantepec, Isthmus of, 169, 352, 492. 

Temperate and intemperate provinces, 337. 

Temperate dry forest, 234-236. 

Temperate summer forest, 232. 

Temperate zones, 181, 185. 

climate of, 218, 225. 
Temperature, 174^185. 

effect of clouds, 174. 

heat belts, 177. 

range of, 180, 182. 
Temperature belts, 181. 

map, 185. 
Temperature zones, 180, 181. 

map, 183. 
Terminal moraines, 116, 119. 
Teutonic languages, 429. 
Textiles, 289. 
Thorn forest, 234. 
Thorn scrub, 234. 
Thrace, 465, 466. 
Thunderstorms, 209. 
Tibet, 54. 
Tidal power, 317. 
Tides, 153-155- 
Tierra del Fuego, 516. 
Timber, 294. 



INDEX 



541 



Timber line, denned, 58. 

Tin, 301. 

Titicaca, Lake, 498. 

Tobacco, 286, 365. 

Toddy, 285. 

Tokyo, 488. 

Toledo, 370, 372. 

Tools, 303, 304. 

Tornadoes, 208. 

Toronto, 386. 

Trade (see Commerce), 320, 325, 326. 

Trade winds, 190. 

relation to rainfall, 213. 
Tramontana, 473. 
Transportation of freight, 100, 320-325. 

in Africa, 506, 507. 

in Alaska, 514, 515. 

in China, 483. 

in deserts, 409. 

in France, 444. 

in Germany, 449. 

in Holland, 451. 

in India, 502. 

in Italy, 474. 

in Japan, 487. 

in Mexico, 490, 491. 

in northern Canada, 517. 

in Russia, 455. 

in South America, 499, 509. 

in the United States, 374-378, 394-397, 
409. 
Transportation of sediment, by glaciers. 
115-116. 

by streams, 75, 76, 78. 

by winds, 135, 136. 
Transported soils, 140. 
Transvaal, 509, 510, 239. 
Transylvania, 463. 
Transylvanian Alps, 453. 
Trapping, 267, 269, 516. 
Trentino, 477. 
Tributaries, 76. 
Trieste, 477. 
Tropical calms, 190. 
Tropical dry forest, 233. 
Tropical rain forest, 229, 231. 
Tropical soils, 144. 
Troy, N. Y., 372. 
Tundras, 223, 241, 242, 519. 
Tunis, 446. 

Tunnels, 323, 324, 469. 
Turin, 475. 

Turkey (bird), 283, 359. 
Turks, 466, 429. 
Turpentine, 307. 
Typhoons, 208. 

Ukraine, 459. 
Undertow, 131, 153. 

United States, agriculture in, 360-366, 397, 
403, 413. 
cities of, 380-390, 407, 416-417. 



United States, climates of, 218-220, 359, 
391, 400, 412, 415. 

commerce in, 378-390, 415-417. 

herding in, 360, 393-394, 402, 413. 

manufacturing in, 370-374. 

mining in, 367-370, 405-408, 414. 

natural provinces, 356-417. 

people of, 419-423, 359, 393. 

physical features (see Streams, Plains, 
Beaches, etc.). 

population map of, 421. 

transportation in, 374-378, 394-397, 409. 
United States Geological Survey maps, 39. 
Uplands, 53. 
Ural Mountains, 519. 
Uruguay, 508-509, 221. 

Valencia, 479. 
Valenciennes, 443. 
Valleys, 62. 

age of, 88. 

drowned, 103, 162. 

forms of, 84-88, 77. 

glaciated, 114, 115, 116, 11.7. 

hanging, 116. 

relation to streams, 88. 

upper, middle, and lower parts of, 86. 
Valona, 466. 
Vancouver, 348. 
Vapor, 172, 174, 193, 194. 

condensation of, 194, 195. 
Vegetable growing, 270. 
Vehicles, 322. 
Veldt, 239. 
Venezuela, 237, 498. 
Venice, 474, 476, 168. 
Vera Cruz, 491. 
Verdun, 443. 
Vesuvius, Mt., 472. 
Victoria (city), Hongkong, 484. 
Vicunas, 282, 499. 
Vienna, 461. 
Vinegar, 284. 
Vineyards, 276, 364, 473. 
Virginia City, 406. 
Volcanic cone, 64. 
Volcanic lakes, 127. 
Volcanic lands, 64-68. 
Volcanoes, 64-68. 

economic relations of, 67. 

map, 68. 
Volga River, 453, 455. 

Walloons, 446, 429. 
Walrus, 245, 521, 522. 
Warsaw, 458. 

Wasatch Mountains, 350, 351. 
Washington, 385. 
Washington, Mt., 343. 
Washoe District, 405-407. 
Water (see Streams, Sea, Lakes, Standing 
water, Rainfall, etc.), 9, 24-26. 



542 



INDEX 



Water, animals living in, 243-245. 

circulation of, 33, 34.- 

forms of, 32. 

needed by plants, 147. 

transportation of freight by, 324. 
Water buffalo, 279. 
Waterfalls, 93. 

economic relations of, 94. 
Water gaps, 345, 60. 
Water plants, 227. 

Water power, 59, 94, 101, 104, 105, 315-317. 
Water sphere, 9. 
Water supply of cities, 98, 99. 
Water table, 132, 147. 
Water vapor, 172, 174, 193, 194. 

condensation of, 194, 195. 
Waterways, 325. 
Watkins Glen, 96. 
Wave power, 317. 
Waves, description of, 152. 

gradation by, 130. 

work of, 153. 
Weather Bureau, 199, 206. 
Weathering, 72. 
Weather maps, 199. 
Weather maps for January 28-31, 1909, 

200, 202, 203, 205. 
Welland Canal, 375. 
Wellington, 512. 
Wells, 134. 

Welsh mountains, 435. 
West coast climates, 220. 
Westerly winds, 190. 
Western province of Europe, 425, 428. 
West European province, 337, 428-452. 
Westminster, 437. 
Whales, 245, 306-307. 
Wheat, 271, 362-363, 509. 
Whisky, 285. 

White Mountains, 58, 343. 
Whitney, Mt., 347. 
Wilmington, Del., 371. 
Wind belts, 189. 



Wind power, 311. 
Winds, 184-192. 

cyclones and anticyclones, i£ 

economic relations of, 192. 

effect on isotherms, 177. 

erosion by, 136. 

gradation by, 135—138. 

laws of , 184, 188-192. 

maps of, 186, 187, 191. 

tornadoes, 208. 

wind- worn plain, 52. 
Wines, 276, 285, 443, 478. 
Winnipeg, 390. 
Wood, 294, 311. 
Woodland, 228. 

dry, 233-236. 

wet, 229-233. 
Wool, 280, 291. 
World economy, 32-35. . 
Worn-down plains, 44, 53. 

Yak, 279, 399. 

Yam, 267, 269, 274, 493. 

Yangtze River, 483, 104. 

Year, 17. 

Yellowstone Park, 132, 346. 

Yezo, 486. 

Yokohama, 487. 

Yosemite Valley, 97, 98. 

Young stream, 87. 

Youth of land forms, 88-91. 

Yucatan, 355, 492. 

Yucca, 392, 402. 

Yukon plateau, 348, 518. 

Yuma project, 404. 

Zambezi River, 93, 94, 104. 

Zebra, 248, 251. 

Zebu, 279. 

Zinc, 301. 

Zones of temperature, 180, 181. 

map, 183. 
Zurich, 471. 



INDEX OF REFERENCE MAPS 

Page 

Relief of Earth Crust 22-23 

Volcanoes and Earthquake Areas 68 

Physiographic Provinces ; 70-7 1 

Soils 141 

Mean Annual Surface Temperatures, Ocean Currents, and Coast Lines . . . 160-16 1 

Mean Annual Isotherms . . 176 

Isotherms for July 178 

isotherms for January . 179 

Annual Range of Average Monthly Temperature 182 

Temperature Zones 183 

Temperature Belts '. 185 

Isobars and Winds in July 186 

Isobars and Winds in January 187 

Ocean Winds 191 

Weather Maps, January 28-31, 1909 200, 202, 203, 205 

Mean Annual Rainfall 2 10-2 n 

Summer Rainfall 214 

Winter Rainfall 215 

Climatic Regions 224 

Plant Regions 230 

Density of Population 261 

Human Economies 268 

Natural Provinces , 328-329, 358, 430-431, 482 

Physiographic Provinces of North America 340 

Climatic maps of North America 354, 357 

Physiographic Provinces of Europe 424 

Climatic maps of Europe 426, 427 

CONTOUR MAPS (U. S. G. S.) 

Coastal plain, drowned valley, barrier beach, and lagoon, New Jersey 42-43 

Worn-down plain, Georgia 46 

Alluvial plain, Wabash River, Indiana 47 

Glacial plain and cliff coast, Illinois ■ • 5° 

Portion of the Great Plains, Colorado 5 1 

A portion of the Sierra Nevada, California 55 

Dissected plateau and cliff coast, California 57 

Appalachian ridges and water gap, Pennsylvania 60 

Hills of accumulation, with basins, Wisconsin 61 

A volcanic cone; Mt. Shasta, California 65 

Grand Canon of the Colorado, Arizona 85 

Maturely dissected plateau, West Virginia 89 

Niagara Falls and Gorge 9 2 

543 



